OFFICIALS MONITOR PATH OF HURRICANE RINA

All eyes are on Hurricane Rina. The system went from a Tropical Disturbance to a Hurricane in less than twenty four hours. And forecasters believe that the season's sixth hurricane is destined to be a major storm perhaps as strong as a category three hurricane. A short while ago we spoke with National Emergency Coordinator Noreen Fairweather for the latest update on the Hurricane watch on Hurricane Rina.

Noreen Fairweather - NEMO National Coordinator
"The NEMO National Executive met this afternoon and subsequent to that we issued this pubic advisory in terms of the status of where we are with Hurricane Rina. At three o'clock NEMO declared phase two red one which is a Hurricane watch from Belize City north to the Belize Mexican border. Water taxi operations will be suspended tomorrow due to the possible evacuation of San Pedro and Caye Caulker and the public is advised to take note that this will be affecting their travel plans to and from the islands. School will be closed for San Pedro and Caye Caulker tomorrow; the UB Gym will be used as a shelter for the people that are being evacuated from San Pedro and UB Scarlet Macaw building will be used as a shelter for the Caye Caulker people that are evacuating, these are the designated shelters as published in our national shelter list for evacuations. The operations coming out of the Cayes, in San Pedro the NEMO Coordinator will be overseeing those operations and out of Caye Caulker the Belize Coast Guard will be overseeing the operations out of Caye Caulker. As a result of all these movements, in the North part of the county, bus runs in the north will be impacted by some of the runs that are running in that area so folks using the public transportation in those areas need to be cognizant of that and their movements will be interrupted in terms of the scheduling and so on. We are asking the public to please take note that the evacuation of the islands will be affecting their travel plans, I know that people need to get to and from work and will be reporting to work tomorrow. NEMO would like to advise the general public to remain on full alert as we continue to monitor Hurricane Rina. We also want to make another announcement as relates to public officers, the Ministry of Public Service has issued a release and they are requesting that public officers who have been assigned shelter management duties in the Belmopan area to report to the Shoman Resource Management representative and that is at the City of Belmopan emergency operating center and that is located at City Hall on Trinity Boulevard and they are being asked to report at six a.m. tomorrow morning so that's the shelter managers for the Belmopan area are being asked to report to the City of Belmopan EOC at six a.m. where they will be assigned their specific duties at that location. All other public officers are asked to keep abreast of the NEMO advisories and to remain on standby in the event that shelters are required to be opened in other parts of the country. More than likely some of that will be happening on Wednesday as we seek to evacuate the coastal communities running from Belize City area that has the advisory to the north those communities such as Sarteneja, Chunox, Shipstern, Bomba, Santa Ana and that entire area in the northern of the country so we are asking public officers to be alert. Persons have been issued their advisories as to what areas they would be assigned duties so once that announcement comes out they are asked to report to the nearest human resource management representative at the EOC that has been designated for them in that particular city or town. Public officers are also reminded that if they need to take shelter in a district, town or city they should report to the EOC in that area so if you live in area where you yourself will be sheltering, you report to the EOC in that area. The Ministry of Public Service is asking that we share those reminders with officers at this time. Generally we ask the public to remain on full alert and listen to the official advisories that will be issued by NEMO and the national Met Service."

LOVEFM