The Tribune

EDITOR, The Tribune.

One of my aunts, whose father taught her and her sister basic weather forecasting as children, has suggested that I express her frustration with all the to-ing and fro-ing these days, about whose fault the devastation was, because the people in the eastern islands did not get the message, on what the weather was doing.

In her day, and her father’s before her, almost every household and public place in The Bahamas kept a barometer for weather forecasting. A relatively inexpensive device that does not need electricity, nor batteries, and is foolproof at predicting hurricanes, and more importantly, their strength.

Perhaps our Government will get one for every Commissioner’s Office, on every island in the Bahamas. As the modern mobile phones have taught us, one only has to give it a tap tap on the face, to see what the pressure is, then mark it, so you can tell the difference next time you tap. When the pressure starts going down the weather is coming, and when it goes up, it’s time to clean up. How far it goes down tells you, more or less, how strong the wind will be.

Barometers abound on e-Bay ranging in price from $15 to $100. A stitch in time saves nine.

BRUCE G. RAINE

Nassau,

October 9, 2015