Hurricane Isaac and more

Good afternoon,

Being a superstitious sailor in the Grenadines I was reluctant to post anything on Isaac so far.
He has been a bit of a troublesome storm to predict (what's in a name, right?) and still is.
Here in the Grenadines we had LOADS of rain and some very gusty winds from all directions.
To my knowledge only a few boats hit each other caused by shifting winds, some dragged anchor, but the only very unfortunate thing that happened was the ship that managed to get himself stranded east, yes east, of West Cay.

Probably due to poor visibility captain did not interpret the light on West Cay correctly.


Thanks to Christian Schrijver, who took this picture, the crew is safe.
He caught the Mayday and went out in his little dinghy to see if he could help.

The weather was awful, you are one heroic good sailor.



What is next for Isaac? As we speak, Isaac is AGAIN trying to make up his mind where he wants to form a center, so it is a wait and see now.


Meanwhile, news and weather forecasts and speculations will be coming in on Isaac, especially since he still has a possibility to hit Tampa where a pretty major political even is scheduled to take place.
However, we are now looking at the Africa computer models, they are in quite good agreement that the next storm will form off Africa next week. So far all storms have followed more or less the same track, Kirk next?

All the best, Maria

Ernesto first storm for the Grenadines?

Hello everyone,

And it is official!!! Ernesto is here.
At this moment there is a high chance, 70% that a low pressure area in the Atlantic will become a tropical storm within the next 48 hours and that it will be very close to us. As of this writing the system is at 12N 48W, and the forward track is slightly WNW.
2 of the reliable computer models have it tracking directly over Bequia. The system will be named Ernesto if further strengthening into a tropical storm.
The government has issued a press release, part of it here (it is a holiday today)

"The St. Vincent and the Grenadines Meteorological Office will continue to monitor the development of this system and will be issuing further statements on its progress over the next few days."

 

Interesting tidbit: in 2006 tropical storm/hurricane Ernesto was named just a few miles west of Mayreau, it became the most costly tropical storm/hurricane of that year, estimated $500 million in damage and 11 deaths.

See track from Wikipedia archives to the left.

Lets hope history does not repeat itself.

Be careful everybody, these computers are good but they don't know everything, this is still the weather!

I include a link here that gives you the current situation, we are after all in 2012:

http://www.wunderground.com/tropical/tracking/at201299_model.html

All the best, Maria

PS. Whoops, at 17.00 1st August, minutes after I wrote the above, it is now Tropical depression number 5 located at 12.2N 49W. At this moment we are under a tropical storm watch.

Marijuana in St. Vincent and the Grenadines

Hello Everyone,

There seems to be a lot of news lately about marijuana legislation. As this "unofficial" agricultural product in St. Vincent and the Grenadines could make a significant source of revenue for the country I'd like to explore some pros and cons concerning legalization specifically concerning this country.

Lets start with the cons:
Obviously, smoking pot is harmful to a human being, one joint is the same as 10 cigarettes (which are still legal by the way), it has been a well known fact for a while that cigarettes are bad for you.
It has been said that use of Marijuana may lead to use of  harder drugs such as heroin or cocaine. That may very well be true, as right now it is still in a criminal circuit, so exposure to the hard drugs will be facilitated.
Where is the sense in legalizing if surrounding countries still have marijuana as an illegal substance, packaging and having it on a boat will be facilitated but there will be a huge problem granting an export license, what use is a ships manifest going to be except for an immediate incarceration
And  last but not least, lots of countries would definitely react negatively if St. Vincent and the Grenadines legalized cannabis, meaning less foreign aid. The pertinent question here is one of $$$ balances I guess.

The pros:
TAXES TAXES TAXES, Cannabis is a drug, same like alcohol and could be heavily regulated as such.
Revenue from tourism could be enhanced, I am sure there would be tourists wanting to visit a Caribbean Island to smoke some weed on the beach legally.
The quality of the cannabis produced on the fertile soil in St. Vincent is reported to be very good, it could definitely be used for medicinal purposes, even be an export product as that.
Less pressure on the police and the jails.
And last but not least: if the hard working Marijuana growers that are now operating small hardly accessible farms could go a bit more in the open (I envision government land leases for example) they could employ workers and have byproducts such as carrots, tomatoes, pineapples etc!