Marijke Pelders braces herself for tropical storm Bonnie on Curaçao. It is expected to reach the ABC islands next night and could become a hurricane. Marijke is originally from Rijen but now lives in Willemstad.
“I have now removed all loose things and stuff that roamed around from my garden”, Marijke said on Wednesday morning in the radio program ‘Wakker!’ on Omroep Brabant. “The neighbors are also busy cleaning up everything.”
“The question is how long this will last.”
After a call from the government to prepare for the heavy and probably very wet weather of the coming days, residents are stocking up on food and drinks en masse. A curfew will be imposed on Curaçao because of the tropical storm. It will take effect Wednesday afternoon at 4 p.m. local time.
“We have to be at home then and are not allowed to go outside for the time being,” explained Marijke. “The question is how long this will last. We will gradually only hear about the storm when we can go outside again.”
In any case, the schools on Curaçao are closed on Thursday and Friday and all shops have to close. The largest hospital in Curaçao has shut down the entire surgery program and canceled all outpatient visits. Only the Emergency Department will remain open during the storm’s passage.
“At first I thought of the ‘KNMI code red’.”
Marijke, laughing: “When they announced code red here last morning, I was still thinking about the ‘KNMI code red’ from the time I still lived in the Netherlands. That you buy an extra bottle of wine and then sit it out. But now that they’re closing the schools here and taking all those other measures, you realize: okay, I have to take this seriously. So I looked in the fridge last night and thought: maybe I should have some tomorrow morning too the supermarket in…”
In addition to stocking up on extra water and food, Marijke has also thought of flashlights. “Because the electricity wires are mainly above the ground here, so there is a considerable chance that something will happen with them.”
“I wonder what it will look like here in two days.”
According to Marijke, the most exciting will be the wind. “We always have wind here from one side, but apparently it will now turn 180 degrees and come from the other side.” That’s a thing, she explained. Because everything on the island, the houses and the terraces, is actually designed for the wind from the usual side. “Those beautiful golden beaches that we have here, the storm will come in soon. So they will probably wash away. I am very curious what it will look like in two days. It is exciting, yes.”