The six-month Atlantic Hurricane Season started quietly on Sunday, as often the case. Its peak period in terms of tropical weather systems for the region is historically August and September, although July and October are known to be quite active as well.
In fact, November 1999 saw one of the island’s most impactful cyclones, Lenny, a rare occurrence because it first passed well south to then turned and approach from the south-west, while such disturbances usually come from a generally eastern direction. This once again confirmed that – despite all modern technology – predicting the weather and its effects accurately remains tricky business.
Early precautions and closely monitoring meteorological reports are therefore essential, in order not to get caught off-guard. The centre spread of today’s newspaper is intended to help readers do just that.
In particular global warming is believed to be increasing both the strength and frequency of tropical systems, so enhancing local resilience must be a priority. Rising sea levels are also a major related threat to the islands.
Calls in the Dutch Caribbean to swap debts to the Netherlands for dealing with the consequences of climate change deserve at least serious consideration in The Hague. Having to repay all current loans including COVID-19 crisis liquidity support on schedule would not only strain the budgets of Curaçao, Aruba and St. Maarten, but make it difficult at best to invest enough in such mitigating measures.
Granted, the Dutch government is granting 150 million euros to promote energy transition in the three Caribbean countries of the kingdom, of which St. Maarten will get 33.46 million. Adequately preparing the islands for climate change, however, would likely take far more than that.
