A warning is being issued that the Cayman Islands may be without its Meteorological Office and could lose vital equipment during a storm. 

Senior Manager of the Cayman Islands Meteorological Service, Fred Sambula, made that revelation to Cayman Net News this week.  

Mr Sambula said the current office building is the greatness weakness in the agency’s preparedness for the 2006 hurricane season, which begins in June.

“It’s just not properly secured, it’s an older building. It’s not the type of structure right now I think will stand up, so I wouldn’t endanger my staff,” he said.

“Where the Met Office is housed right now I would not advise my staff to come in to work, once a hurricane is within 12 hours of the Cayman Islands. What we lack is a robust building for the Met Service and that is where I think we need to concentrate.”

Mr Sambula said he has begun discussions with government officials on the matter and is awaiting a solution.

During September 2004, Hurricane Ivan devastated Grand Cayman, putting the Met Office out of commission for a month.  

“After Hurricane Ivan had passed, the Met Office was incapacitated. This building was out of function, it was breached with water and we lost some equipment,” he said.

This month, scientists William Gray and Philip Klozbach of the Colorado State University predicted that we could look forward to another busy hurricane season with 2006 having an above normal number of hurricanes.

Despite the vulnerability of the office, Mr Sambula is pleased with the high quality of personnel and the equipment at his office. 

“In terms of human capacity the Met Office has a bank of professionally trained people – weather forecasters, weather observers and climatologists. We do have the equipment to track the systems as they come through. We have real time satellite machinery with direct connection so that we can receive and transmit information,” he said.    
    
The practice of relocating staff and some equipment to the Emergency Operations Centre (EOC) at the Fire Services Headquarters in George Town has serious setbacks on its operations.

Accessing information from the Met Office after it had been vacated has not worked well in the past, he said.

Mr Sambula said Jamaica is the immediate backup station for the Cayman Islands in case something goes wrong here.

“If Cayman fails Jamaica automatically begins to do forecasting for the Cayman Islands, that’s within the regional hurricane plan,” he said. 

However, he has concerns over the lack of telecommunications infrastructure at the Met Office.

“If we don’t have the communication to receive or communicate with Jamaica we’re still in the dark.

“It’s important that the Met Service has the proper telecommunications infrastructure to be able to continuously receive information before, during and after the system.

“I’m afraid that within this present structure that’s not a possibility. I’m fearful that this will be repeated if we get another hurricane,” he said.