A navy rush caused material damage this Sunday, May 4 in Guadeloupe. The firefighters received “several calls”, at the beginning of the afternoon, to “report what is a mini-tornado in the village of Baie-Mahault,” said Sdis Guadeloupe.
A navy attempt caused material damage this Sunday, May 4 in Guadeloupe, taking part of the roof of a school, while the archipelago is returned from orange to yellow vigilance for heavy rains and thunderstorms in the evening, we learned from the firefighters.
Treated trees, carried away, damaged vehicles and shops: the inhabitants of the town of Baie-Mahault, located in the center of Guadeloupe, relayed the spectacular images of this rare phenomenon on social networks.
A marine rush is the equivalent of a terrestrial mini-tornado with the difference that it forms above a water area. It happens that the phenomenon reaches the coast before losing in intensity.
No victims
The firefighters received “several calls”, in the early afternoon, to “report what is a mini-tornado in the village of Baie-Mahault,” said Sdis Guadeloupe on Sunday afternoon.
“There was no victim” but “we had a lot of luck. If that had happened during the week there would have been more injured,” Colonel Félix Anthénor-Habazac, director of the Departmental Fire and Rescue Service (SDIS) Guadeloupean, told AFP. “Electric wires have fallen to the ground” and “roofs have been swept away, including that of the infirmary of the Louis-Andréa school, in the town,” he said.
Why can it rain fish?
Videos posted on social networks show a marine rush quickly moving into the town, many steering debris in the sky, uprooted trees, damaged vehicles and ground roofs.
“It was really impressive”
On Guadeloupe la 1ère, a resident says: “It was really impressive to see everything that was flying in the sky, it is the first time that I have seen that since the Hugo cyclone”, the hurricane which devastated the archipelago in 1989.
“This is a first for us on Baie-Mahault, we are not used to this type of event, generally we see this on TV in the United States,” reacted the mayor of the town, Hélène Polifonte, still on Guadeloupe the 1st.
In a statement released on Sunday evening, EDF Archipel Guadeloupe indicates that “the vast majority of households are again fed with electricity” and “reminds the whole of the population not to touch the electric cables even fallen to the ground”.
