INTERNATIONAL NEWS
“Hurricane Felix was a non-event for Roatan regardless of the coverage on CNN”
— Keyhole Bay Developer Dan Taylor
Contrary to news reports, Honduras, Roatan Island,
weather Felix with Typical Tropical ease
The man gave the Little Pig the bricks, and he built his house with them.
So the wolf came, as he did to the other little pigs, and he huffed, and he puffed,
and he huffed and he puffed, and he puffed and huffed; but he could not blow the house down.
—Leslie Brooke
ROATAN ISLAND — Come on in, the water’s fine!
That's the message from the sun-baked residents of Roatan Island, the Western Caribbean tropical paradise that weathered the gentle winds of Hurricane Felix with nary a palm branch blown askew. And that's despite breathless dispatches from frantic reporters who often had difficulty distinguishing trade winds from torrential gales.
Wrote Keyhole Bay owner/developer Dan Taylor to scores of well-wishers who had left him messages of alarm and condolences, "Hurricane Felix was a non-event for Roatan, regardless of the coverage on CNN and on the Weather Channel. Each spoke about Roatan and showed pictures of places that were flooding and inundated with water such as Aruba....
"As for us," Taylor added, "it sprinkled a little, but not enough to get all the dust off of the pickup truck or rinse it off the road. The wind blew a little, but not enough to comment about other than it came from a southerly direction rather than from the normal easterly direction. The best thing that happened is that we got practice preparing for a major storm and we had a few days with some cloud cover, which made it cooler for the guys working on the new condo building."
Though Taylor took a light touch, other Roatan business owners were not quite so sanguine about the overblown coverage, some even calling for a retraction from leading news outlets. Wrote a blogger named "Penny" on the popular Roatan Chat discussion forum (roatan@yahoogroups.com), "As a business owner and resident of Roatan I am infuriated and outraged by the CNN coverage.
"After we went through Wilma two years ago, we were out of power for 13 hours, and all businesses were back up and running in 4 days. Yet, because of the horrific media coverage, all the dive trips and resort reservations were cancelled for months. Now, the business community may be crippled again. Go to CNN.com, click on Report Error Seen on CNN. If every one of us emails them, perhaps we can get a retraction.
Added another blogger, Kent, "Last night CNN's Susan Candiotti reported (supposedly from La Ceiba) on the impending tragedy for Roatan and La Ceiba, showing a beach scene ostensibly in La Ceiba of big waves and rocking palm tress. Only problem is that I was on the beach and the waves were 1/2 inch high and the coconut trees just sitting around. Right now, its sunny and calm in La Ceiba, and people are heading to work and the reporters are packing up to go look for the next 'tragedy'."
According to Taylor, an engineer by trade, part of the reason for the discrepancy between the reporting and the actual facts on the ground may be due at least in part to a misunderstanding in the media about the changing face of what many now call the "Caribbean Riviera." This includes Roatan and the North Shore of Honduras.
"We often hear about generals fighting the previous war; well, in a situation like we have just seen, some journalists - particularly those sent scurrying from one assignment to another with little time for preparation - end up fixating on the previous hurricane. The fact is, Felix was not Mitch. And 2007 is not 1998. The times have changed, and so has much of the Honduran infrastructure, particularly on Roatan.
Taylor points out that the infrastructure at Keyhole Bay, Roatan Island's first fully self-contained New Urbanism community, actually exceeds many of the stringent Miami Dade County hurricane code requirements. Each of the new luxury condominiums is constructed of reinforced masonry, with triple-ply, hurricane-proof windows. Triple-hinged exterior doors open outward to resist gale-force winds. And terracotta roof tiles are glued into place with a newly developed super-bond adhesive to keep them from becoming damaging debris. The community has won two highly coveted environmental awards from the Honduran government and has become a benchmark for quality construction.
"There's a new breeze blowing through the Latin America," Taylor said. "Even at its strongest, that breeze may huff and puff - but it won't 'blow the house down.' And that's the real story that needs to be told about today's Roatan Island." |
