Hurricane Dean claims two lives

Disaster officials have confirmed the first death of Hurricane Dean. At about 12:30pm today, a major landslide in the tiny village of Campbell swept away three houses killing 25-year old Juliette Esprit and her 7-year old son Jimmy Alexander in the process.

According to unconfirmed reports, Juliette, a clerk of the Campbell/Despos village council had just finished helping a number of persons in that community move to the hurricane shelter when she returned home to attend to some personal matter. She was accompanied by her 7-year old son.

While still inside, a massive slide occurred sweeping all of the houses (including Juliette’s) in its path downhill burying them under a pile of rubble and debris. A number of villages and the Mahaut Police rushed to the scene and were able to recover and dig her lifeless corpse out of the rubble. However they had to abandon their search as conditions were too unstable resulting in further slides (that threatened the life of the rescuers). Her son Jimmy Alexander has not yet been found and is feared dead.

Juliette’s body was taken to the Princes Margaret Hospital where it was examined and pronounced dead on arrival by Dr.Rachel Andrew.

The 25-year old single mother, as a Councilor was love by all and was totally dedicated to her community and people. She was also enrolled at the University of the West Indies School of Continuing Studies where she was pursuing a degree in Business Management.

A number of persons from Campbell and across Dominica have been expressing their sympathies with the family and community upon the tragic loss. Honourable Vince Henderson, the acting Prime Ministers expressed condolences on behalf of the government of Dominica to the family of Juliette and son. He described Juliette’s death as a “tragic and a significant loss for the community of Campbell.” Henderson used the opportunity to once again urged Dominicans to exercise extreme care and caution.

Meanwhile Parliamentary Representative for the Campbell constituency, Rayburn Blackmore confessed that he was “totally shocked and taken aback” by the tragic and untimely death of Juliette and her son. He said he had been with Juliette all morning as she was helping him organize activities in the community. The last time he heard from her was at 11:40 am. She sent him a text message which read “now we’re having some major landslides and I will call you to inform you later and the rain is very heavy now.” That follow-up call was never made; Juliette perished under one of these slides. The Campbell MP said “she died saving her community; saving her country.”

Disaster officials say the search for Jimmy will resume tomorrow 

Hurricane Dean dumped between 7 to 10 inches of rain on Dominica for fifteen straight hours triggering off a number of major landslides throughout the island. A number of villages have been totally cut off from the rest of the island. Emergency response units and a number of community groups have been working to clear the roads of fallen trees, boulders, slides and other debris. The public Work’s Corporation has been placed on full alert and will move into these communities as soon as conditions improve and the weather stabilizes.