The Tribune

THE massive relief operation to get help to the southern Bahamas island ravaged by Hurricane Joaquin continues apace on Saturday with DC-3 cargo planes in the air after leaving with supplies packed in Nassau.

One plane from the Tribune Media Groups' SOS - Save Our South operation landed in Crooked Island on Saturday morning, where nurses Stubbs and Bonaby in a clinic set up at the Colonel Hill airport made an appeal for generators in order to store and refrigerate insulin for diabetics and other medical supplies. With the help of relief organisation HeadKnowles a solar-powered generator was delivered later, according to Robert Carron, the president of the Tribune Media Group, who organised the flight.

One mother of five from Colonel Hill pleaded for her family - including three adults - to be evacuated later today by returning planes. She was concerned that her youngster had been bitten by a mosquito and feared infection.

The evidence of devastation around the island included a BTC communications tower at Major's Cay - built to withstand winds of up to 150mph - snapped in half, water turning stagnant and the road at Winding Bay washed away by the storm surge. There was also anger from one resident who felt that he was being prevented from doing an urgent job nearby by the local MP V Alfred Gray, who he claimed was bringing in someone from Acklins.

Leslie Miller, the MP for Tall Pines, couldn't believe what he was seeing on Crooked Island. "It is unbelievable the degree of the destruction. It makes you appreciate what nature and what the seas is all about and the force that that hurricane that has done to this island.

"I cannot believe that a road can be totally taken by the seas. Its unbelievable that this beautiful beach has been formed where this road once was. You have to see this to believe it." He estimated that the cost of repairing the road would be "half a million dollars".

Mrs Neely, the Crooked Island Adminstrator, told The Tribune that "every building on this island has been affected".

She appealed for cleaning supplies - bleach and Pine-Sol - "because the water is now becoming compromised". She listed towels, bedding, portable gas stoves, sheets and plastics for beds because the mattresses were not dry among immediate essentials.

Mrs Neely said she had been in Nassau when the storm hit and when she returned on Sunday she found her house damaged and all her personal effects lost. The worst hit areas she said were Landrail Point and Cabbage Hill. "We definitely need more manpower on the ground," she said and a need for high vehicles as there was an flooded area almost a mile long which was impassable.

Mr Miller and John Bostwick, the former senator, were part of the visit on behalf of One Bahamas.

Mr Bostwick told residents that the stories reaching Nassau were that "Crooked Island has been destroyed, that Crooked Island seriously is sinking under the seas" and that people had abandoned the island, wanted to leave and not return. He said he wanted the right message to go back to Nassau. He was told emphatically by one resident that "Crooked Island is not going to be abandoned. I can assure you that Crooked Island is going to be rebuilt."