Ernesto

If you have been watching the weather, you might have noticed tropical storm Ernesto.  It is on track to hit Belize in the next 12 hours as a category 1 hurricane.  Fortunately last night it took a slight turn north and so the Toledo district might do better.  We are moving inland today about 4 miles to the clinic since our house is about 20 feet from the bay.  With the hospital only a block behind our house, our clinic was previously designated as the disaster coordination and emergency hospital for the Toledo district.   Let's hope it doesn't come to that as it could be very comical (in a sad way) as our clinic is quite small!

We are very concerned about our house and you can pray that the roof will stay on.  It is a cement block house with a metal roof and pressed board dropped ceilings.  We have been concerned for a while that the ceilings might fall in because with the rainy season storms, the wind blows the metal sheets up enough to allow some rain to deposits on the ceilings.  With any sustained winds, we are not sure that the roof will stay intact.  Bill and the boys are going to try and tie it down this morning with rope (Yes, even in Belize it qualifies as red-necked!).

Also, please pray for the people in Belize City.  The storm appears to be headed straight for them and city is made up of many wooden shacks with a few concrete houses but most have the corrugated metal roofs as well.  I am sure that Mom and Dad will agree after meeting us in Belize City for the weekend, it is not somewhere where you would want to ride out a hurricane.

Internet has been spotty this past week and neither FaceTime nor Skype has been functioning so we are not expecting to have much communication in the next few days.  At least it is giving the medical students from the U.K. this month quite an experience!

Angela




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