50 Percent Of St. Croix Residents Were Without Power During Tropical Storm Bertha, WAPA Says

WAPA  has confirmed that at the height of tropical storm Bertha’s passage on St. Croix, 50 percent of residents were without power.

That’s according to the firm’s spokesman Jerain Fleming, who also confirmed that several feeders were affected during the storm, but was kin to make known that crews were traversing the Island, working overtime to restore power as quickly as possible. Fleming also said that crews took shelter for safety as Bertha intensified on St. Croix.

According to Fleming, St. Thomas experienced outages in the Emerald Hill area as a pole there caught fire, as well as Anna’s Retreat because of another pole issue.

Passing through Gallows Bay on Saturday morning while visiting the Pearl B. Larson voting precinct for 102.1 FM, Life Radio’s political coverage, I saw downed tree branches on the side of the Canegata Ballpark, along with broken power lines. WAPA field employees were on the job however, and quickly went to work making sure that the area was safe.

Meanwhile Bertha was making its way away from the Islands late Saturday afternoon, and the tropical storm warning was discontinued as of 5:00 pm that day, as confirmed by the National Hurricane Center.

By 6:00 pm, ports that were closed throughout Saturday had been given clearance to reopen, and the first ferry from St. Thomas to St. John was scheduled for 6:30 pm.