March 17, 2010
Dear Brethren, Friends and Family
Ni sa bula.
Happy Birthday to our grandson Truman! (Three big years old.)
I must apologise for the Subject of the last email. It was not February's
report. I know there were some of you shaking your heads thinks, "this
boy doesn't know...(you fill in the blank) ...." I was however trying to
get information out in case there were power outages. But thankfully there were
no power outages here in the Western side of the island. (However we had a 3
hours outage on Sunday afternoon which did not help our feeling of impending
doom.)
Much like I predicted, cyclone Tomas held to a southery line just off
to the East of the main islands. The island of Viti Levu (where we are) was
far enough from the eye of the storm to escapes the destructive winds and heavy
rains. The lowest pressure we experienced here in Vuda Point was 996 hp. Vanua
Levu (the Northern large island) and the Lau group where the hardest hit. The
reports are that 70 houses were destroyed, a hospital lost part of it's roof
and a lot of flooding from high seas surges in coastal areas and the islands.
The areas that took the hit from Mick in December were spared this time and
the areas that were not affected by Mick got hit this time. There was one death
in the North and it was before the storm even hit land.
Joshua talked with Anna after the storm passed Labasa and said that
they had to evacuate to higher ground when the rivers rose very quickly. He
said they are all okay! However communication and power is down all over the
island and some roads are still impassible.
On Sunday night there was a country wide curfew but the powers that
be finally woke up to the fact that the Western district was not affected so
the curfew was lifted Monday. However buses did not begin running again until
this morning. Monday and Tuesday we had some gusting winds but very little rain
and this morning it is calm, very humid and back to real time here in Fiji land.
The buses came by this morning, the schools were told to resume and
hopefully the government workers will go back to work as well.
Cyclone Ului is still affecting the Solomon Islands at this time.
Thank you all so much for your prayers.
Your seed sowing workers in the Kingdom.