Leaders of the volcano-plagued St Vincent have warned that water is running low as heavy as supplies pollute, amid estimates that the eastern Caribbean island will need hundreds of millions of dollars to recover from the La Soufrière eruption.
Between 16,000 and 20,000 people have been evacuated from the northern region of the island, where the exploding volcano is located, of which more than 3,000 are housed at more than 80 government shelters.
“We need to get things rolling in people,” Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves told a local NBC Radio news conference.
But no casualties have been reported since the first major volcano exploded early Friday. “We have to try to keep the record,” he said. Gonsalves said some people have refused to leave communities closest to the volcano, urging them to evacuate.
He estimated that the country needed hundreds of millions of dollars to recover from the eruption, but gave no details.
Ash and falling floods destroyed crops and polluted water reservoirs. Garth Saunders, Minister of Water and Sewerage Authority on the island, noted that some communities have not yet received water.
‘The windward [eastern] coast is our biggest challenge today, ”he said during the press conference about efforts to use water trucks. ‘What we offer is a limited amount. We’ll run out sometime. ”
The prime minister said people in some shelters needed food and water, and he thanked neighboring countries for transporting items, including cots, breathing masks and water bottles and tanks. In addition, the World Bank paid out $ 20 million to the St Vincent government as part of an interest-free disaster financing program.
Adam Billing, a retired police officer who inhabited and cared for his crops on the land near the volcano, said he has more than three acres of plantains, tannias, yams and a variety of fruits, and he estimates he has more than $ 9,000 lost crops.
‘Everything [means] livelihood is gone. Everything, ”said Billing, who was evacuated. “We have to look at the next few months because this is not going to be an instant solution from the government.”
The volcano, which has had a low eruption since December, experienced the first of several major explosions on Friday morning, and according to volcanologists, the activity could continue for weeks.
Another blast was reported Tuesday morning, sending another massive ash plume into the air. It comes on the occasion of the 1979 eruption, the last one produced by the volcano until Friday morning. In a previous eruption in 1902, about 1,600 people died.
“It’s still a pretty dangerous volcano,” Richard Robertson told the University of the West Indies’ Seismic Research Center. “It can still cause serious damage.”