TRINIDAD is shrinking. On every coast, the ocean is clawing at the land.

[stikid09]

TRINIDAD is shrinking. On every coast, the ocean is clawing at the land.

A dramatic example of this unstoppable force was the collapse in February of the cliff face in Cedros that consumed almost five acres of land on a peninsula that the experts say is losing as much as two metres of land every year.

But long before Cedros, coastal residents have been watching the sea with unease.

Coastline erosion is something that often happens imperceptibly slow, over hundreds, thousands of years. But people are seeing landforms reshaped in mere decades.

On Trinidad’s rocky north coast, village elders can tell of the stacks and arches, islets and caverns erased in short years, of sand beaches swept away to reveal long buried rock formations, and of seafront homes undermined and lost to a conspiracy of wind, waves, currents, tides and a rising sea level linked to global warming, melting the ice caps and glaciers.

On the island’s east coast, the roads to the old cocoa plantations and beaches in North Manzanilla now end abruptly at precipices, and the sea takes chunks of fertile land with every high tide.

The bathing beaches between Manzanilla and Guayaguayare are losing the coconut trees and seawalls. Tidal surges have made brackish swampland out of cropland. Beachfront home owners spend a fortune protecting their investment, defending with boulders, tyre revetments, tree trunk groynes, rock cages and concrete embankments. The Atlantic always wins, in the end.



In the natural harbour that is the west coast, the battering swells in the Gulf of Paria have been taking back the land reclaimed along the King’s Wharf, San Fernando, at Waterloo’s cremation site and the Temple in the Sea, and overtopping the Mosquito Creek road with increasing frequency. The Shore of Peace Cremation Site would have been lost if not for a $60 million coastal stabilisation, that also stopped the advance of the sea in the Cocal, Manzanilla.

But nowhere is the evidence of Trinidad’s losing battle more striking than on the south coast with its retreating clay and sandstone cliffs. Here is it recorded that up to twelve metres of land have eroded in a single year in areas between Los Iros and Quinam Bay- the location of south Trinidad’s most visited beach, which no longer exists.



A similar rate of erosion has taken place along Moruga’s south coastline where at the once popular La Retraite Beach, a visitor must descend a cliff to get to the shore.

Moruga is also where you will find more worrisome evidence of what is happening - concrete abutments of flood gates and fishing boat landings now sitting out at sea, the staircases of houses embedded in the sand littered with uprooted forest trees and bamboo groves.

At Gran Chemin, Moruga’s main village, the St Peter’s statue erected by custodian of the area’s history Eric Lewis, is now threatened. Its foundation is being licked by the waves finishing off the nearby fisherman shacks and derelict port facility.

But it is this very coastline destruction in Moruga that has revealed a piece of Trinidad’s history buried for so long that, when the waves exposed it some weeks ago, few knew what it was.

Its presence was brought to our attention by Moruga building contractor and community activist Loretto Miguel who himself wanted to know what the thing was, and whether the State had a plan to stop to damage being done to the fishing facility.

If you visit the village coastline at low tide, you will find a thick metal cable emerging from the muddy sea, snaking along the sand, and disappearing into the land near the Moruga Roman Catholic Church.

https://www.trinidadexpress.com/feature ... 3b5ce.html

[Daran]

Very obvious in Manzanilla too

[Numb3r4]

Good.

[Gem_in_i]

When you fill one side it takes from another side.

[MaxPower]

Cancel carnival....only then will the locals give a rats..

[VexXx Dogg]

more prevalent on east and south coast?
I can't say the erosion is that rapid on the west coast (I live pretty close to the sea/swamp/mud in central); and North coast has been relatively stable over the years.

[maj. tom]

but I think this was happening for a good few million years now you know.

[RedVEVO]

but I think this was happening for a good few million years now you know.

Exactly ...

Since Trinidad was attached to Venezuela ..
Then it was detached by Thanos .

Tobago was detached from Grenada

[The_Honourable]

Moruga... St Peter's Statue

Shocking evidence of unchecked coastal erosion.

[Lou Screuz]

Between 2000 and 2010 - this is what the oil windfall should have been spent on - massive coastal protection works - along with food/water/energy security.

Instead we get a Church in Guanapo , Divine Echoes , NAPA , Ghetto expansion , Gangster Contractors , a 1.2 billion dollar stadium, 3 Billion dollar nothing in petrotrin, communist china infiltration and CHOGM.

[nervewrecker]

When you fill one side it takes from another side.

[randolphinshan]

Between 2000 and 2010 - this is what the oil windfall should have been spent on - massive coastal protection works - along with food/water/energy security.

Instead we get a Church in Guanapo , Divine Echoes , NAPA , Ghetto expansion , Gangster Contractors , a 1.2 billion dollar stadium, 3 Billion dollar nothing in petrotrin, communist china infiltration and CHOGM.

From 2010-2015 we had lifesport, 1 billion dollar wastewater plant that has not produced a drop of water, 6 million for a 2 million fire tender, billions in box drain and road paving given to contractor friends that have all collapsed, etc, etc,etc... pick your poison

[Blaze d Chalice]

Don't forget Jaguar with extended wheelbase.

[screwbash]

push over the statue and dig underneath, dey used to put up them statues to guard an mark wey dey bury the treasure. jus like the one in pos where Chris C coming off the boat and pointing an the one on the old road etc.

[bushwakka]

Don't listen to ingalook

[Mark!]

Rel frigging scientists in here boiii

[ruffneck_12]

Time to buy cheap land in Rio Claro and play the waiting game till it turns into beachfront property then sell

[Chimera]

I have some land that's just behind beach front. Hoping to be beach front soon.

[EFFECTIC DESIGNS]

I have some land that's just behind beach front. Hoping to be beach front soon.

The problem with that is eventually it will be taken over by the sea, but its gonna take a while so you will be able to enjoy it for a long time so there is a lot to look forward to while it last.

You know funny thing the earth has gone through so much changes in those billions of years just imagine the planet got so hot at one point it killed off the dinosaurs ancestors then it got so cold it killed off another countless number of species in the Ice Age. Then we have land that just appeared out of nowhere as the earth went through changes.

I stop worrying about this crap, life is too short to be concerned with these things that are inevitable regardless of man's impact. Let generation Z complain about this on social media with the power of likes and retweets. I going and just enjoy life while it last

[Chimera]

As soon as it become beach front ah selling

[rspann]

Before it underwater?

[Chimera]

Yea as soon as the neighbor property back wall collapse I selling

[Jade_Inc.]

Ayee what u saying lol

Time to buy cheap land in Rio Claro and play the waiting game till it turns into beachfront property then sell

[maj. tom]

just marrid a Rio Claro baytee and inherit she fadda land.

But then she family will murder you for the land and burn down your house when she father ded.

[EFFECTIC DESIGNS]

Them places can't really be called beach front nah...... Trinidad isn't a Caribbean Island, there is a reason the beaches in this country look so terrible compared to Tobago. This island sits on the South American plate, them so called beach front property won't be worth sh!t when the water finally covers your neighbor property because where the sea water comes into land it basically turns land into a giant swamp. It will be more like Swamp Land Property which is actually worth even less LOL

[matr1x]

Between 2000 and 2010 - this is what the oil windfall should have been spent on - massive coastal protection works - along with food/water/energy security.

Instead we get a Church in Guanapo , Divine Echoes , NAPA , Ghetto expansion , Gangster Contractors , a 1.2 billion dollar stadium, 3 Billion dollar nothing in petrotrin, communist china infiltration and CHOGM.

From 2010-2015 we had lifesport, 1 billion dollar wastewater plant that has not produced a drop of water, 6 million for a 2 million fire tender, billions in box drain and road paving given to contractor friends that have all collapsed, etc, etc,etc... pick your poison

Meere pittance compared to what pnm and 1 % stole

[RedVEVO]

^^

Meere pittance compared to the erosion of the ozone layer ..

[Lou Screuz]

Between 2000 and 2010 - this is what the oil windfall should have been spent on - massive coastal protection works - along with food/water/energy security.

Instead we get a Church in Guanapo , Divine Echoes , NAPA , Ghetto expansion , Gangster Contractors , a 1.2 billion dollar stadium, 3 Billion dollar nothing in petrotrin, communist china infiltration and CHOGM.

From 2010-2015 we had lifesport, 1 billion dollar wastewater plant that has not produced a drop of water, 6 million for a 2 million fire tender, billions in box drain and road paving given to contractor friends that have all collapsed, etc, etc,etc... pick your poison

u r an illustration of why we go never get anywhere

2000 to 2010 also includes some UNC too . but the reason i singled out that timeframe is because that was when we had one hell of an oil/gas windfall -.

Back then whenever people like me was saying every which way we could - letters to d editor - radio call in - public meeting -

That now is the time to lay down the basic planning so we could feed ourselves
That now is the time to make sure people 200 years from now have water easy easy
That now is the time to produce and save.
That now is the time for fiscal conservatism and smaller government.
That now is the time for upgrading the base infrastructure - and otherwise leave business to the businessmen
That free tertiary education is not going to work out the way they think it will
That now is the time to become a population that can build houses for themselves - not depend on d goverment to do it for them-

...pnm people used to call people like me unpatriotic.
...pnm people used to say i only jealous because is not ah indian in power.
...pnm people used to say i racial.
...pnm people used to say i only wishing the government bad and i too negative

well here we are now.


By the way - exactly what went on with the wastewater treatment plant ? You could educate me on that ? Why the wastewater plant didn't produce one drop ? Was it even completed ? why did the project stop ? did someone stop it ? please inform me.