Roofing torn off by a tornado that landed on Grand Bahama Wednesday morning.
FREEPORT, Grand Bahama – A suspected tornado passed thought Freeport Harbour Company around 0700 hours on Wednesday morning and caused extensive damages to terminals, warehouses, power lines, and fencing, but fortunately no loss of life or injuries resulted.
Warehouse #12, which houses the administration staff for the Facilities Department and Mechanic Shop suffered major roof damage.
All buildings have been secured with barricades and red caution tape for crowd control; Facility electricians have turn off the power to these building because of the amount of live electrical wires.
The Facility Department will temporary relocate to warehouse #11 until further notice. The building is unsafe for use at this time.
At Terminal #1 utilized by Discovery Cruises, the severe weather brought down power lines, communication lines, cable lines, utility pole, trees, and fencing. Fortunately because Discovery does not sail on Wednesdays, the area was unoccupied. There were no damages to Terminal #1, Warehouse #5, or any of the Security buildings, other than minor water leaks.
GB Power, Cable Bahamas and BTC were all called in to make the necessary repairs to restore communication, and to secure a number of live lines that came in contact with metal fences and properly reconnected them.
However, at Terminal #2 where the Royal Bahamas Police is housed, there was extensive damage with the roof caving in over the police structure, and severe damage to the remaining roof. One-third of the roof was destroyed and completely torn away from the building. There are minimum visible structural damages at the east side of the building. The cargo section (Metal Building) of terminal #2 was also damage. A temporary location is needed for the police station office as 1/3 of the sheet metal roof was destroyed.
The approach buoy that was reported missing this morning landed onto the beach at Our Lucaya; it will remain there until the weather conditions change when it can be replaced back into position. There was also one trailer-truck that overturned causing damage to another pick-up truck.
The winds are expected to pick up again by mid-day according to the weather department, therefore, all clean-up works will be suspended until Thursday.
Thanks to the quick action of the administration and staff of the harbour, the facility is open and operating as usual.
Freeport Harbour Company (FHC) operates one of the fastest emerging cruise and maritime centres in North America. FHC is privately owned and operated by a joint venture between the Hutchison Port Holdings (HPH) Group and the Grand Bahama Development Company.
Hutchison Port Holdings (HPH), a subsidiary of the multinational conglomerate Hutchison Whampoa Limited (HWL) is the world’s leading port investor, developer and operator with interests in 24 countries throughout Asia, Pacific, the Middle East, Africa, Europe and the Americas.
Committed to innovation, HPH is one of the most technologically advanced ports operators in the industry.
Today, HPH has operating rights in a total of 292 berths in 47 ports and owns a number of transportation-related service companies.
