Hurricane Dorian brings back memories

In this weeks 2 year anniversary of hurricane Irma hitting the island of Sint Martin the main focus this week was on even a bigger monster: hurricane Dorian. I guess anyone anywhere has heard of how this monster has wiped out the Bahamas, and it really is a truly heartbreaking thing to see.

When looking at the stats around hurricane Dorian, also starting around the Cabo Verde islands, also having windspeeds of 200 mph and also being in these weeks the similarities with Irma really are travelling to mind. With a couple of differences in there.

Dorian is travelling slow AF. Like 5 mph an hour slow. Now this has resulted in that this monster was hanging for more than 25 hours above some islands. Irma rushed over Sint Martin within 8 hours. And I can honestly say: thank God this was only for 8 hours. Because a: everything was falling apart like a madman even this fast, and b: in hours you still remain sane. I mean thinking about being in that drama for 25 hours would be enough for me already to drive me mad.

I think the one thing that we were 'lucky' of with hurricane Irma, is that there was hardly any water involved. The storm surge was there, surely it was, but with the levels that the Bahamas were experiencing that would resulted in my death for sure, because I spent a good while of Irma in a cellar. Weird to think about that.

Water is scary bananas when it comes to storms. I saw a video today of a dude who was filming from his house where the water was up to his windows of about 20 feet high. 20 damn feet. And the things is then again compared to a 'regular' flood, you won't be sitting on your roof to flee the flood during a Cat 5 hurricane. I tell you...that stuff must have been scary.

So I spent a good deal of time talking about my experiences again this week. Because a lot of images came back to mind, also about choices and 'what ifs' where in there. I could tell from the Caribbean people around me and also my own loved ones that this Dorian story was more around in our minds than we had expected and that we had wanted.

Traumatized is a word that I would never use, but yes...Irma left more marks on us than that we actually would like to help. And now the question rises as after all these major events. How do we help? Because from what I remember....it's difficult getting aid when having a fully disfunctional harbour and airport. And because the destruction is so big...where do you start. I'm keeping my eye open for charity that will reach fast...because that is what these folks deserve!