Has Hurricane Damage In Belize Been Repaired

Hurricane Richard was the seventeenth named tempest and the tenth hurricane of the 2010 Atlantic hurricane season. Richard developed from an expanse of depression force per unit area that stalled in the Caribbean Sea in mid-Oct. It slowly organized, and the National Hurricane Center declared it a tropical tempest, giving it the name Richard on Oct 20, and information technology did non proceeds hurricane status until the morning of October the 24th. The hurricane continued intensifying to peak winds of xc mph (150 km/h), and the minimum central pressure dropped to 981 millibars, thus creating a category 1, borderline category ii hurricane. Throughout Belize, Hurricane Richard caused an estimated BZ$49.ii 1000000 (US$24.vii one thousand thousand) in harm; BZ$14.5 one thousand thousand (U.s.a.$7.3 million) to infrastructure and BZ$34.seven one thousand thousand (US$17.4 1000000) to agriculture. An estimated 200 houses were destroyed or heavily damaged. Simply one direct human fatality has been blamed on the tempest, when a pocket-size fishing vessel sank amidst rough seas in the hurricane. Ii indirect fatalities were reported after the hurricane. While the material impairment was relatively depression, the damage to natural vegetation was all-encompassing. The private Protected Area Runaway Creek (impairment described equally "moderate with with virtually of the damage consisting of delimbing and defoliation [comm. Steven Brewer]) was in the firsthand path of the hurricane. Savanna habitats along the coastal road were largely unaffected, but Oaks sustained heavy damage by being toppled [comm. Alan Graham]. Guanacaste National Park was heavily afflicted (see pictures). The Belize Zoo, needed to be closed for a full month assuasive for repairs. Damage to wildlife is besides apparent with particularly the Spider Monkey populations in the afflicted areas being heavily impacted. Similarly Toucans accept been seen at unusual places since the hurricane and these are certainly refugees. Species such as Toucans and Spider Monkeys depend on fruit for their nourishment and near fruits have been stripped from the copse. While direct bloodshed was probably not a hugh issue, long term survival and reproductive health of the populations of many species is probably negatively afflicted for at least this year. Impacted fauna will largely consist of nectar and fruit feeding species such every bit the Spider-Monkeys and Toucans, but besides includes Kinkajous, Fruit eating Bats, Hummingbirds, Curassows, Trogons and others. Further inland, the Light-green Hills Butterfly Ranch was affected with many copse downwardly, fortunately, there was no damage to the buildings and the place could exist opened to the public inside only i day after the hurricane. Specially badly hitting was the Yalbac forest, although furthest away from the coast it probably suffered more heavy impairment than whatsoever other expanse. During the coming dry season wildfires are going to be a major threat to these hurricane damaged forests. In April 2022, the number of wildfires started to increase and some of the forested areas within the Hurricane Richard path have been severely affected. These fires raged for nearly 2 months, affecting (nationally) 86,400 ha / 213,500 acres of broadleaf forest. Download the study on the 2022 fire impacts
	400 km Radar Image, Late Saturday/Early Sunday. Richard has only been upgraded from a tropical storm to a Category ane Hurricane Paradigm generated by Belize National Meteorological Service
	50 Km radar Image, 18.53 hr local time Simply subsequently nightfall, hurricane Richard makes landfall in Belize approximately between Belize City and Dangriga. The center is very distinctive at this stage Image generated by Belize National Meteorological Service
	250 Km Radar Image, 21.45 Local Time The center has but passed Belmopan, and is essentially of the same diameter equally when it made landfall. Image generated by Belize National Meteorological Service with thanks to Bruce Miller for recording information technology
	250 Km Radar Image, 23.35 Local Fourth dimension Just around midnight, hurricane Richard leaves Belize, the centre is dissipating and before long after this Richard will be reduced to a tropical storm. Image generated by Belize National Meteorological Service with thank you to Bruce Miller for recording it
Utilizing the radar maps above and combined with ain and third party on the ground observations, an touch map was created. See below. The actual path of the hurricane was approximately threescore km (40 miles) wide. The "edges" of the hurricane were non a well demarcated as was the case in hurricane Iris. Particularly in the transition zone hurricane force/tropical storm force, harm to forests is specially patchy with some areas suffering more intensive impairment than other, adjacent areas. Hilly areas appear to have been affected heavier than level areas. Total afflicted expanse by the hurricane Richard is approximately 968,000 ha or two,391,000 acres. Specifically for forest, within this expanse approximately 163,000 ha or 400,000 acres of forest has been severely affected (see yalbac examples below).

Approximate path of Hurricane Richard over Belize. The darker shaded zone in the center is the path of the actual eye. The medium shaded surface area is the surface area with hurricane strength winds causing considerable impairment to natural vegetation. The lighter shaded area is a tropical storm strength zone. The yellowish barred zone is the zone of credible highest impact. Notice that this does not exactly follow the path of the eye. The distinction between the zones is indicative only and based on very express ground truthing.Click image for a larger picture show (jpg - 700 kb)

Post-obit are some pictures showing impairment in selected areas:


UB Facility at Calabash Caye (picture show courtesy of ERI at UB)	UB Facility at Calabash Caye (picture courtesy of ERI at UB)

Coastal Route - Sibun (Picture courtesy of Allan Graham)	Belize Zoo - Male monarch Vulture Display (picture show courtesy of Sharon Matola)

Guanacaste National Park (after cleanup!)	Guanacaste National Park

St. Hermans Cave, 2months after the outcome. The remaining copse take become "vine pillars"	St. Hermans Cave, 2months after the event.

Dark-green Hills Butterfly Ranch	Green Hills Butterfly Ranch

Light-green Hills Butterfly Ranch	Yalbac (Motion picture courtesy of Yalbac Ranch)

Yalbac (ii months after the upshot)	Yalbac (2 months subsequently the event)

Gallon Jug (Motion picture courtesy of Carolyn Miller)	Chan Chich (Motion-picture show courtesy of Carolyn Miller)