Learning from hurricane Irma in St. Maarten
The first thing we did was simply start mapping damage to vital infrastructure, coastal defence, sewerage, schools, hospitals, drainage, roads and of course housing. We did not have to do all this ourselves as we received a lot of information from aid organisations that came to work on the emergency. We brought all the information together to produce a coherent post disaster needs assessment for the city.
We are also making grateful use of the plan that was given to us by RvO.nl for the reconstruction of St. Maarten after the devastating hurricane Irma in 2017 in our Beira Recovery and Resilience Plan. Another report that was of great use was the Masterplan for Beira, prepared by Dutch organisations in the past. It helped us determine our approach to issues such as coastal defence and sewerage.
In the meantime, the city does not need to wait for our plan to be ready or for the donor conference. A lot of work is already being done to alleviate the needs. Through DSS water, the Netherlands is already helping get the drinking water supply back in order.