Power Going Up

The Virgin Islands power supply comes from WAPA (Water and Power Authority). All of the power is generated using fossil fuels. As you can imagine, getting the fuel here is more expensive than in other places. The average price per Kw hour in the United States is 9.09 cents. Here in the Virgin Islands, it is now 55 cents per kwh. In June a 22% increase was approved. Just this week, another 19% increase was approved. So in three months, we have gone from 36 to 55 cents. That kind of increase is unheard of anywhere else. The second increase really has people wondering how the island, its residents and businesses, are going to cope. Another price increase has been the Ferry companies adding an additional $1.10 to every passenger ticket for a fuel surcharge. The VI Daily News did an article before the increase. Click Here to Read.

Tropical Storm Fay

By now you have heard of Fay. Just yesterday she got her name legally changed from Invest 92 (aka The Joker) to Fay. The Joker formed overnight in the mid Atlantic on Sunday August 10th. Although no models predicted it forming into a hurricane, the track of the tropical wave had the Northern Antilles in its sites (thats our neck of the woods). No one was even sure if it would become a tropical depression, but we have to watch it because its out there. Within 2 days a whole new path had been predicted which would route it out to sea and it was weakening. That's good news for us, we don't have to worry about watching it anymore. Then, the morning of the 13th, everything has changed. What was Invest 92 had been unofficially dubbed "The Joker". The path has changed and it had started to intensify again. They officially categorized it a Tropical Depression (tropical wave --> depression --> storm --> hurricane). Where did that path change to? It looked as though all four model predictions had their lines drawn straight through St. John. Sure enough, Thursday night at around 11pm the light show started. We've definitely had worse thunderstorms, but it still didn't provide for a great nights sleep. The rain was much needed on the island and there was no damage, so we are thankful for that. So although we did have an encounter with this storm, we caught it, or it caught us, early on before any intensification. We will still be watching to see the effects it has on Cuba and the States.