Late December, 2017

In an earlier post I mentioned the banyan trees in Old San Juan had been particularly hard hit by Hurricanes Irma and Maria. It turns out I was a bit premature in making that statement, for a couple of reasons.

Now, I must admit, I don’t know much about trees. This has been a source of some embarrassment, especially given my pre-retirement position as a faculty member at the New York State College of Environmental Science and Forestry. Many times, when making conversation with strangers, they would ask where I worked. They usually got all excited when I told them. Their eyes lit up, and they said “Oh great. I have this tree in my backyard . . .” When I told them I did  not know much about trees, they looked at me quizzically and said “Well then, what do you do there?” When I replied that I might know a bit about water, they invariably said “That’s not the problem. The tree gets plenty of water.”

This happened to me again and again, in coffee shops, dive bars and pre-symphony cocktail receptions. I vowed to learn more about trees, but I admit I never got around to it. I was just too busy building my wall. My willful ignorance has now come back to haunt me, in the form of banyan trees.

I first noticed what I thought was a banyan tree in a botanical garden on the island of Dominica. I vaguely recalled they were native to the Indian sub-continent. It was there with a Norfolk pine (from Norfolk Island, in the southwest Pacific, another introduced species) and several other specimen trees as well.

I recognized trees I thought were banyan trees in several places around San Juan.  I learned that many of these trees have been introduced to tropical areas around the world as ornamental trees. In fact, Parc Luis Munoz Rivera, across the street from our building, is known for its many banyan trees. They line some of the walkways and provide welcome shade to the park goers. I have, on occasion, sat on a bench under the canopy of what I thought was a  banyan tree and thought great thoughts, or at least my version of great thoughts. The botanical problem is they may not have been banyan trees, at least in the strictest use of that term.

Banyan trees are examples of fig trees, and fig trees have been around for a long time. Some biblical scholars argue that a fig, and not an apple, was the forbidden fruit in the Garden of Eden. The Latin words for apple and evil are the same: malum, and it may have been the Latin bibles that spread during the Middle Ages that caused the change of fruit in the creation story.

 Mithra, a Persian deity and Judge of Souls, was born under a fig tree, and figs were his first meal. In Kenya, the Kikuyu’s creation story starts in a grove of fig trees. On Guam, ancestral spirits (taotaomonas) live in the roots of fig trees. In Australia, aboriginal peoples know of the yara-ma-yha-who, a man-like vampire that lives in fig trees and preys on unwary travelers.  The Greeks have multiple stories concerning fig trees. In one, the fertility goddess Demeter created figs to repay King Phytalus for his help as she sought Persephone, her lost daughter.

Some time during the sixth to fourth century BC, a prince was born to a royal family in what is now Nepal. As he matured, Siddhartha Gautama began to wonder about the sickness and death he saw all around him. He left his home, wife and child at the age of 29 to wander the world in search of meaning. He studied under wise men but was not satisfied with their teachings. Six years into his journey, he arrived at a forest in what is now the  Indian state of Bihar. He sat under a fig tree and vowed not to leave until he reached inner peace. According to legend, he stayed there for six days and six nights; on the seventh day he found enlightenment and became the Buddha. He taught a Middle Way between sensual indulgence and the strict asceticism of his time.

Somewhat later, around 325 BC, Alexander the Great, having conquered most of the known world, turned his attention to India. As a scholar as well as a military leader, Alexander brought naturalists with him. They were intrigued by what they discovered – colorful birds, monkeys, exotic snakes, but nothing matched their interest in the banyan tree, large trees with multiple trunk-like roots. Alexander’s colleague Nearchus estimated 10,000 soldiers could get shade from one banyan tree.Alexander and his retinue of naturalists brought news of the unusual tree back to Athens where the Greek philosopher Theophrastus, a student of Aristotle, learned of it. Theophrastus (371 – 287 BC) had already become intrigued by figs; he observed carefully the trees that produced edible figs and noted that the soil and climate and tiny insects seemed to determine the quality of the figs. His observations were sound in this and other matters; he is known as the father of modern botany. He described the banyan tree: “The Indian land has its so-called “fig tree”, which drops its roots from its branches every year . . the fruit is very small, only as large as a chickpea, and it resembles a fig.’

A banyan tree in Pakistan. The tree’s columnar trunk-like roots allow the tree to spread; some old banyan trees cover up to two hectares.

Theophrastus did not call the fig tree from India a banyan tree; that came later. Portuguese traders noticed that the Hindu merchants (banya in the Gujarati language) they dealt with gathered under the fig trees described by Theophrastus. The Portuguese used banya for the merchants but it was soon generalized to became the name of the tree under which the merchants gathered.

The Swedish botanist, physician and zoologist Carl Linnaeus (1707- 1778), the father of taxonomy, denominated figs into the genus Ficus, with species names as appropriate. The banyan tree became Ficus benghalensis; the fig tree under which Buddha sat Ficus religiosa; the edible fig Theophrastus studied Ficus carica.  Linnaeus named seven Ficus species. There are now more than 750 known Ficus species.

Systematic taxonomy is one thing, but understanding the life cycle and ecology of fig trees another. One mystery was that fig trees, while producing a fruit-like fig, never seemed to display flowers. Ancient Hindu and Buddhist texts used the phrase ‘seeking flowers in a fig tree’ as we use looking for a needle in a haystack. A Tamil language proverb describes how a fig tree’s ‘flowers bloom secretly and fruits flourish visually’. We now know a fig is a hollow ball, the inner surface of which has flowers that never see daylight. How these flowers get pollinated and produce seeds is a complex and fascinating story In itself.

A fig wasp of the species Idames.

Like all plants, fig trees have evolved ways to put energy into making seeds, and strategies to aid in their dispersal. Fig trees have co-evolved with insects, usually fig wasps, relatives of the small insects Theophrastus observed. When a fig ripens, a female fig wasp, only about 2 mm long, responds to some unknown cue and emerges from a small hole in the fig. She is laden with hundreds of fertilized eggs and she must find a fig tree of the same species. She also carries pollen from the flowers within the ripe fig.

Her journey is perilous. Upon first emergence, predatory ants and other insects lay in wait. If she is able to take flight, she has to contend with other predators – dragon flies, bats, birds. The fig trees emit a combination of chemicals unique to its species; the fig wasp navigates towards them and thus finds the correct species of fig tree. Each species of fig tree has one, rarely two, species of fig wasps adapted to its reproductive needs.

The flight of some fig wasps have been shown to be as long as 160 km – awesome for an insect only 2 mm long, but it is the last centimeter of her travels that are the most crucial. The wasp lands on a fig less ripe that the one she left, and locates a tiny hole at the tip. She pulls herself into the fig, shedding her antennae and wings in the process, and using her wedge like jaws to assist. Once inside the fig, and assuming no predators lie in wait, she walks along a carpet of fig flowers. Some get pollinated, into others she deposits a fertilized egg. The pollinated flowers produce one seed each; the others become nurseries for the larval forms of the wasp’s offspring.

After some weeks, the larvae, one per egg-bearing flower, reach sexual maturity. The males live a short life; they burrow out of their galls and find a gall with a female inside. They use a tube on their abdomen to drill through the gall and deliver sperm to the female. Some species of fig wasps are active pollinators – a male, after inseminating the female, uses its jaws to harvest the pollen-bearing stalks of the fig’s male flowers. As the females emerge, they use their forelegs to harvest the pollen and store it in pollen pockets, cavities on their chest.

The females, now laden with eggs and pollen, need to emerge from the fig to start the cycle again. The males, in their last act, team up and chew a hole in the fig’s wall. The males emerge first, perhaps sacrificing themselves to predators to increase the female’s chances of survival. The females emerge and, if all goes well, fly away to another fig tree, leaving behind a fig with seeds ready to be dispersed.

Each fig species has evolved its own pollination strategy. In some, the male and female flowers are on different trees. In others, the pollination is passive, almost by accident, rather than the active pollination described above. But however the fig seeds become pollinated, they need to be dispersed. Again, various strategies have evolved to meet this need. And fruit-eating animals play a crucial role.

The ripe figs, with their payload of seeds, are a source of food for many animals, some of which help disperse the seeds. Green pigeons, for example, eat figs but their gizzards grind the seeds to nothingness. Other animals, gibbons, orangutans, flying foxes (really bats), many birds species, eat the figs and the seeds pass unharmed through the digestive tract, to be dispersed with their feces. One spectacular fig-eater and seed dispenser is the rhinoceros hornbill, native to Borneo.

A rhinoceros hornbill (Buceros rhinoceros), one of many animals that feed on ripe figs and disperse their seeds. This image was originally posted to Flickr by David Berkowitz at https://flickr.com/photos/25897810@N00/9049988503. It was reviewed on 15 March 2016 by FlickreviewR and was confirmed to be licensed under the terms of the cc-by-2.0.

The location of the dispersed seed is crucial. Take, for example, Ficus stupenda, a fig tree native to Malaysia. This species begins life as an epiphyte and so the seed has to land in a knothole, crock, crack, crotch of a host tree, with appropriate moisture and organic matter. And the height on the host tree is important with different optimal heights for different fig species. The seed germinates by sending a shoot up with two leaves, and a root down the trunk of the host tree into the soil. Shoots beget shoots, roots beget roots, and soon the fig tree becomes established. Some epiphytic figs grow so many roots and branches they strangle the host tree and have earned the name strangler fig. Ficus benghalensis, the true banyan tree, is an example of a strangler fig.

An uprooted banyan (?) tree in Old San Juan, just up from the San Juan Gate.

So I wondered what kind of trees I had been seeing. Clearly, they were not true banyan trees. It turns out there are three species of figs introduced and found in Puerto Rico, all of which are often planted as ornamentals for shade in public plazas. The most common of these is Ficus retusa, characterized by a short runk and globular crown, small, dark green, elliptical leaves, and numerous aerial roots about the trunk. Some of them might be Ficus elastica, also known as the India-rubber fig.

So know I know, or at least think I know. I was sitting under a fig tree, not a true banyan tree, and neither was it the same kind of tree Buddha sat under. That goes a long way in explaining why my  excuse for great thoughts will never be as profound as his. At least, that’s my current theory.

Notes and Sources: See Wikipedia entries for banyan tree, fig wasp, fig tree, fig tree pollination.

Much of the information about fig trees and their natural and cultural history is from Gods, Wasps, and Stranglers, a delightful series of essays by Mike Shanahan, a tropical forest ecologist. It is available from Chelsea Green Publishing, White RIver Junction, Vermont. It was published in 2016.

Identification of the fig trees in Puerto Rico is from Common Trees of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands, by Elbert Little and Frank Wadsworth. It was published by the US Department of Agriculture in 1964, as Agriculture Handbook No. 249. Thanks to my neighbor Lucilla Marvel for loaning me her copy.

December 14, 2017

Yesterday the Puerto Rican government declared Puerto officially ‘open for tourism’. According to the San Juan Star, an English language newspaper here, more than 100 hotels are open, as are more than 4,000 restaurants. There are 60 excursions for cruise ship passengers to choose from. I wonder if this includes the guy who hangs around the piers with an iguana, charging a few bucks to have his picture taken. There will be more than 70 port calls by various cruise ships between now and the end of January. Nearly 100,000 passengers will arrive and start and end their cruises on the four or five ships home ported here, again by the end of January.

As if on cue, two large cruise ships came into port yesterday afternoon, the Holland America Eurodam and the Royal Caribbean Oasis of the Seas. The tour busses were lined up, as were the vendors stalls along the pier and through much of Old San Juan. Passengers had to be back on board at about 10 PM so the cruise people had time to wander around Old San Juan. The Walgreens and CVS pharmacies were both busy. I’m not sure what the attraction is but the two waterfront locations are busy every time a cruise ship is in port.

Tour busses lined up waiting for cruise ship passengers to disembark.

Before IrMaria, tourism accounted for about 16% of the island’s economy, which is less than I would have thought. The biggest sector is manufacturing, at about 48%, and pharmaceuticals figure heavily in that category. Puerto Rico has become a packaging center for drug companies, who ship their products here for packaging for final distribution. There was concern that, after IrMaria, there would be a shortage of some drugs; fortunately, that was not the case.

The government wants to grow tourism to about 20% of the economy. That seems doable to me, but I wonder how tourism in Cuba will affect tourism here. I can see Cuba competing for cruise ship port calls and otherwise attempt to attract tourists there.

Vendors set up along the pier waiting to serve cruise ship passengers.

But that is in the future. Right now, it seems tourists (and their dollars) are more than welcome.

December 14. 2017

A disaster, be it hurricane, tornado, earthquake, wildfire, engenders a response. This is not as easy as it might seem.

Any response requires fuel, for emergency vehicles, utility crews, road clearing, telecommunication repairs. But if power is out, that it is not easy. Gas stations, while perhaps undamaged, need power for the pumps to dispense fuel. No power, no fuel. How about emergency generators, to provide power to provide fuel? They need fuel to generate power to dispense fuel. No fuel, no generators, no fuel for emergency vehicles.

That was the situation here right after Hurricane Maria. Power was out over the entire island. Things came pretty much to a standstill. Dock workers did not have the fuel to get to the ports to off load the ships, some carrying fuel. In the states, adjoining areas would send supplies over the highways to the areas in need. That is not easy here. As our fearless President pointed out, Puerto Rico is in the middle of a big ocean.

But, in the true capitalist spirit, where some see difficulties, others see opportunities. That is playing out in port right now, in view from our balcony. I had wondered about some of the equipment and activities I had been observing.

View of port activities from our balcony.

The ship and tanker trucks were here when I arrived, on November 15. The white rectangular trailers were as well. During the course of a day, several tanker trucks would fill up from the ship and head off to somewhere on the island. There were far fewer of the white trailers then; their numbers have been gradually increasing over the past few weeks.

I also noticed a parking lot dedicated to pick up trucks, which entered and left at all hours of the day and night. Mini busses brought people here around the clock, presumably from their billets. The workers got into their trucks and rode off to somewhere on the island. Each truck appeared to have a small generator in its bed, as well as other tools.

I did a little more research and discovered the white trailers were in fact diesel generators, big enough to provide power for a sizeable building. They run on diesel fuel; when operating at full load, they need to be refueled every day or two. So it began to make a bit of sense. The generators were hauled to places on the island that needed electricity – a hospital, clinic, gas station, whatever. The fuel trucks refueled them every day of two. The pick up trucks probably carried technicians to the various sites to maintain the big generators. All in all, a big operation.

The activity seems to have slowed down a bit since I’ve been here, which suggests to me that fewer and fewer generators are needed. That also explains why the white trailers have increased in number – generators are brought back from sites as power is restored.

It turns out that there are specialized companies designed to provide these specialized services. The logo on the pick up trucks I see tells me the company is Cat5 Resources, with headquarters in Nederland, Texas, and a Caribbean office in Bayamon, close to San Juan. They, according to their website, are a young company, having been in business now for a little over four years. Cat5 offers a variety of services, generator management, emergency fuel supplies, cell tower management and repair – pretty much anything one can think of. I suspect, but I don’t know, that they contract with businesses before any storm and provide emergency generators and fuel to those customers as needed. If that is the case, it seems to me our building management might want to contact them.

There are other companies here as well. A Signal National Disaster Team truck has been parked outside of the still-closed Caribe Hilton since I’ve been here. According to their website, they specialize in restoration of properties that have suffered fire and water damages. They are a mainland US company. Their website does not mention a Caribbean presence. Perhaps the Hilton chain has them on some kind of retainer.

I don’t know the extent of the damages at the Caribe Hilton or at the Condado Plaza, also closed since I’ve been here. I wonder if winds blew out some windows on the ocean side with consequent damages.

I would have to guess these are good examples of growth industries. If I had a spare thousand bucks or so, I’d probably invest in them. Of course, we could start an investment club. I’d be happy to manage your money. Just let me know.

I arrived in Puerto Rico on November 15. My timing was propitious – power had been restored to our building three days before. Our apartment suffered some minor damage. Water seeped in from the hallway and a bit of flooring needs to be replaced. Our balcony awning was destroyed, as was the exterior light fixture on the balcony. No surprise there – wind gusts greater than 125 mph were measured not far from here.

While I was fortunate, power had not been restored in many parts of the city, including major parts of Old San Juan. Our friend Vionette, who stayed there during and after the storm, had no power even a week after my arrival. That was soon to change. She told me there were utility trucks swarming over Old San Juan, from ConEd, the power utility in New York City. One crew worked on her side street for three days. She could not remember their names so she called one of them Brooklyn. She had power back before Thanksgiving.

ConEd crews in Old San Juan, November 2017. Note the utility poles on the roofs, and the narrow streets and sidewalks.

I’m not sure what program or authority caused ConEd to be here, but they came in force, and they were certainly welcome. There must have been 50 utility trucks and associated support vehicles. They were shipped here by freighter; their crews flew in a few days later to marry up with their equipment and start to work. The crews were on the streets starting on Veteran’s Day. They usually, by my sporadic observation, worked independently, although I did notice a very few instances of cooperation between ConEd and the PREPA, the Puerto Rican utility.

I talked to several of the ConEd people. They found the work gratifying and challenging, especially in Old San Juan. There, the electrical system had to be imposed on a city four centuries old. Narrow streets and sidewalks meant distribution poles were mounted on roof tops and hard to access. Several of them told me the system, while workable, had clearly not been upgraded in a while, and routine maintenance had sometimes been neglected.

La Perla, a poor community situated between the walls of Old San Juan and the Atlantic Ocean.

One team of five or six trucks was assigned to La Perla, a poor neighborhood outside the city walls on the north side of Old San Juan, nestled between the city walls and the Atlantic Ocean. The crews (these crews were from Rockland and Orange Counties and they were technically a subsidiary of ConEd) had to dismantle some of their equipment to gain access to the streets there, as the only road in goes through an old gate in the wall. After reassembling their trucks, it took them five days to ‘knock it back together’ as one of them said. One guy bought a bottle of water from a woman in a convenience store there. She broke down in tears. The residents threw a party for the workers as they were leaving. I’m not sure what kind of party exactly, but the ConEd guys were impressed.

Utility crews at work in the Puerta de Tiera section of San Juan, as seen from our balcony. Four trucks worked for three full days along a short stretch of the street.

After finishing their work in Old San Juan, the crews moved steadily eastward, into Puerta de Tierra, Condado, Santurce, Miramar, Ocean Park, Hato Rey. One guy, working in Condado, told me they were frustrated because, while they could knot things back together and restore power, they did not have the material, like utility poles and transformers, to replace things that needed replacement. One friend of mine, in Hato Rey, had his power restored on November 30, another woman I know who lives there was still waiting as of December 4. She did say utility trucks were in her neighborhood and she hoped to have power back that evening or the next day.

I will say the crews are putting in the time.  Every morning from my balcony I see convoys, five of six trucks at a time, leaving from their staging area in Old San Juan and headed east. The start about 6 30 every morning, and usually return in the early evening, just after sunset. One crew told me they expected ConED, and perhaps other utilities, to be here until mid-January. The crews apparently work in five week rotations, so the first crews should be going home soon, to be replaced by new crews coming in.

There are other signs that things are returning to what might be a new normal. According to the paper (we subscribe to the San Juan Star, a daily published in English) the other day, 93% of the island’s public schools are back in session. Thousands of utility poles, 35, 50 and 70 feet in length, are supposed to start arriving in the Port of San Juan, starting today. Contracts have been let around the island for debris removal. Cruise ships are again making port calls; there are three cruise ships in port as I write this. We went to a movie yesterday, and dinner afterwards. The restaurant (Pizza e Barre in Miramar, for those who might know it) was doing a good early evening  business.

But there are, and will continue to be nagging questions about the recovery effort. Most of the people I have talked to think the contract between PREPA and Whitefish, out of Montana, was a disaster. The hospital ship USNS Hope just left, and the feeling is she was underutilized, mostly because of lack of communication and bureaucratic red tape.

One anecdote, I think, captures some of this frustration. A small town somewhere in the middle of the island banded together within a week after the storm and cleaned the school building. They restarted their school, with volunteer teachers and cooks, to provide their children with an education and a good lunch. The government closed it down. They said the town had to wait until building inspectors deemed the building safe.

Now, I’m a big fan of safe buildings. I understand the need for inspections. But this seems a case where the government, rather than quashing this effort, could have expedited the inspection, and worked with the community.

Maybe the story is apocryphal, but it rings true. And I have not yet seen any utility poles coming into port.

A couple of years ago a young friend mine, then a pre-med student at the University of Puerto Rico, told me of some of the projects going on there. I was intrigued by one. A professor was studying mitochondrial DNA composition across the Puerto Rican population. I was surprised to learn that a typical analysis showed a Puerto Rican had 50 % Spanish (or other southern European), 35% African, and 15% Taino heritage. I would have thought the fraction for the Taino, the peoples that populated the islands now known as the Greater Antilles prior to and during the Spanish arrival, would have been less. That it was as high as 15% indicates there must have been significant interactions among the Spanish and the Tainos after the Spanish got here, enough to overcome the effects of disease and war.

The Taino were in fact a generally peaceful people with a complex social structure. They were, at the time of the Spanish arrival, under stress from the more war-like Caribs to the east. Perhaps the Taino saw the Spaniards as allies against them. Their belief system included zemis, spirits or ancestors. One zemi, Artabey, had control over natural disasters, aided by his two assistants: Guatauba, in charge of hurricane winds, and Coatrisquie, creator of floodwaters. It is unclear whether Juracan was a zemi, or just the Taino word for hurricane. In any case, it is likely hurricane is derived from the Taino Juracan made known to the Spanish. It first entered English in Richard Eden’s Decades of the New World, published in 1555:

These tempestes of the ayer (which the Grecians caule Tiphones …) they caule furacanes.

Perhaps some mystic forces disturbed Guatauba, Coatrisquie and Juracan this year, an explanation perhaps better suited to climate change deniers than continually trying to downplay the effects of human-induced global warming. Puerto Rico suffered from two large hurricanes, but the devastation here was largely overshadowed by Hurricane Harvey in Texas, Irma in Florida, and wild fires in California. Even now, late November, 2017, two months after Maria, damages are apparent and recovery efforts are continuing.

Hurricanes Irma and Maria were both so-called Cape Verde hurricanes. These storms begin as a low pressure wave that exits the West African coast near the Cape Verde Islands. If storm development continues, the wave is tracked as an invest, then a tropical depression graduating to a tropical storm to a hurricane. Developing systems track westward across the tropical Atlantic, over large distances of warm water which favors storm development. Cape Verde hurricanes are usually the largest and longest-lived hurricanes of the season. This year the surface sea temperatures in the Atlantic were one to two degrees Celsius higher than long term average temperatures; this was a source of energy for the developing hurricanes.

Map of sea surface temperature anomalies , early September 2017. The colors represent departures from long term average temperatures. The Cape Verde islands are off the coast of Africa, at about 22 degrees west, 18 degrees north. See Notes and Sources for attribution.

Tropical low 93L which would develop into Hurricane Irma. Note the Cape Verde islands outlined below the clouds.

Hurricane Irma began as a tropical wave, invest 93L, first noticed on August 27 or 28. It was identified as a possible hurricane early on and various model runs showed it hitting or passing north of the Lesser Antilles. But that was still five or six days in the future, and model uncertainty is great over that time frame. Irma reached tropical storm status (and earned her name) on Wednesday, August 30. The next day, Irma’s eye became visible and she had intensified into a Category 2 hurricane. Model forecasts continued to show the Lesser Antilles at risk, and a strike on Florida not out of the question.

Irma intensified rapidly and by September 4 was a Category 5 hurricane. Irma, in fact, became the strongest hurricane ever recorded north of the Caribbean and east of the Gulf of Mexico, with sustained winds of 185 mph. She slammed into Antigua, Barbuda,  and St. Maarten, causing great damage. Irma was the most powerful hurricane ever recorded in these islands. A wind gauge on Barbuda recorded a gust of 155 mph before it failed.

A false color image of Hurricane Irma, September 6, 2017. The island of Barbuda (population about 1,500) is outlined in Irma’s eye.

Irma passed just north of Puerto Rico on September 2 and 3. The image at the top of this post shows Irma north of the Dominican Republic heading for the north shore of Cuba. The image also shows Katia (Category 1) to the left and Jose (Category 3) to the right. After pounding Cuba’s north coast, Irma would then veer more northerly and strike Key West and Florida. I’ll leave it to others to describe the consequences of that.

Puerto Rico was lucky. Not only did Irma not make a direct hit on the island, but the storm track was such that the weaker, left (with front as the direction of travel) quadrant affected the northeastern coast. But is was enough to cause damage. San Juan lost power for several days, as did other communities on the northeastern coast. The local power utility was able to get things back together in fairly short order. But by this time, Maria was lurking.

Tropical Invest 96L was noted on September 13 or 14. By the 15th, it showed more organization; the National Hurricane Center gave it a high probability of developing into a hurricane. Computer models forecast potential tracks and growth in intensity even as early as September 15th. The figure below shows potential storm tracks for the developing storm. Note that most of the solutions put Puerto Rico right in the cross hairs for a direct hit.

Forecast tracks for tropical invest 96L which would develop into hurricane Maria. These model runs were done of September 15th, 5 days before actual landfall. Note that most predicted storm tracks, but certainly not all, showed Puerto Rico at of a direct hit from the developing storm. The numbers along each track show hours into the future; 240 would be 10 days.

Like Irma, Maria intensified rapidly. She grew from a low end Category 1 storm to a Category 5 in less than one day. Her track took her a bit further south than Irma; Maria made a direct hit on Dominica as a full-fledged Category 5  on the evening of September 18. Maria was only the fifth hurricane to make landfall in Dominica since the 1830s. Cool ocean temperatures to the east typically prevent storms for strengthening to hurricane status before reaching Dominica. But, as noted above, ocean temperatures were warmer than usual along Maria’s track, abetting rapid storm intensification.

By this time, it was clear Maria was headed to Saint Croix (of the US Virgin Islands) and then Puerto Rico, with a track taking across the island from the southeast to the northwest. This in fact happened, with well-documented catastrophic results. Maria was a devil. Other hurricanes have struck here, but never has one so devastated the whole island. In the past, the population could shift to the undamaged parts as the damaged portions were rebuilt, That was not an option with Maria.

I will leave it to another post to describe the government response, both federal and local. I note in anticipation of that, if I remember correctly,  the federal government did not mention Puerto Rico in any briefing until four days after the storm. The President was golfing, as I recall. When President Trump did come, he tossed paper towels into a crowd gathered within a gated community. Paul Krugman, New York Times columnist, wrote a column with the title ‘Let Them Eat Paper” a few days after that performance.

I arrived here November 15, almost two months after Maria. Fortunately, the power in my building had been restored three days before my arrival. Power is slowly being restored through San Juan – a friend of ours in Old San Juan got her power back 60 days after the storm.

I’ll end this post with some images I’ve collected over the past few days.

A convoy of utility trucks from Con Ed, located in downstate New York. They were swarming over Old San Juan. They had arrived a few days before. Residents were delighted to see them.

Utilities from New York State have recently sent crews and equipment here. I don’t yet know why or how, or why they are here now and not sooner, but I’ll find out. I saw seven or eight ConEd trucks in Old San Juan the Monday and Tuesday before Thanksgiving. I’ve also seen convoys of the same utility heading into other parts of San Juan. Needless to say, the residents are most grateful.

An uprooted banyan tree in Old San Juan. This is near the cathedral, looking towards the San Juan Gate.

Banyan trees, both in Old San Juan but especially in Parc Luis Munoz Rivera, were especially hard hit.

The wind was strong enough to twist streets lights out of alignment.

Many if not most of the street lights are not working. This seems to have made no difference in traffic flow. But is does make a bus ride through an intersection interesting.

You may be happy to know that some things are as normal as ever.

Notes and Sources: See Wikipedia entries for Taino culture, Decades of the New World, and Cape Verde hurricanes.

The meteorology information came mostly from the excellent blog posts on Weather Undergound, www.wunderground.com. The blogs, by Dr, Jeff Masters and Bob Henson, are clear and informative. See the blog archives for more information about the satellite images I used.

The sea temperature graphic came from a NOAA website: http://www.ospo.noaa.gov/Products/ocean/sst/anomaly/.

February 2017

I saw an iguana, a male about 2 feet long, along the wall in back of our building the other day. I used to see several each day, especially on my walks to Old San Juan but there seem to be far fewer now. I wonder why that is.

The iguanas here are green iguanas, also known as the American iguana, of the genus Iguana. It is native to Central and South America and some of the Caribbean islands. It was accidentally introduced to Puerto Rico in the 1970s as a result of the pet trade. It has also been introduced into Florida, Texas, Hawaii, and the US Virgin Islands. Presumably, owners allowed their pet iguanas to escape. The reptiles found the conditions ideal; there are now as estimated 4 million on the island. Locally they are called Gallina de palo and are considered an invasive species. Populations densities of up to 225 iguanas per hectare have been observed. That’s about 58,000 per square mile. That’s a lot of iguanas.

The invaders, with no natural predators here, are altering the ecosystem, burrowing into and weakening dikes, disrupting power lines (and getting fried in the process), destroying native vegetation and ornamental plantings. Two years ago there was a professional golf tournament here. Iguanas on one of the greens became intrigued with the golf balls and butted them around with their snouts. I’m not sure how the rules of golf dealt with that situation. Iguanas are harmless so this is certainly better than running into a cobra on a golf course, as has happened to Australian golfers in Vietnam.

I’m not sure why anyone would want a pet iguana. On the positive side, they are docile and do not require an elaborate diet. They are colorful, often displaying reddish hues. On the negative side, they require special lighting and constant heat. And they are ugly, in a reptilian kind of way. I cringe every time I see one. They remind me of the monsters in the 1950s science fiction movies I used to watch – Godzilla, The Monster That Devoured Cleveland, and the like.

A monster from a remake of a 1950s science fiction movie. That I watched them as a kid probably predisposed me to hate iguanas.

They are ugly for a couple of reasons. The spines along their back are formidable. The dewlap, the longitudinal flap of skin under the chin, can be attractive only to another iguana. The dewlap is thought to have a role in thermoregulation. They are arboreal but can fall to the ground – and land – from as high as 50 feet without apparent injury. An iguana, about three feet long, once landed about ten feet from me as I was walking across a shaded lawn. Scared the hell out of me.

The iguanas in Puerto Rico are one example of the world wide problem of introduced species that become invasive. The forests of Central New York, our summer home, are being altered by the two invasive insects. The hemlock woolly adelgid, introduced from Japan in the 1950s, feeds by sucking sap from native hemlock and spruce trees. The Emerald Ash Borer, a beetle introduced from China in the early 2000s, destroys ash trees when larval feeding girdles the tree and disrupts the flow of water and nutrients. Aquatic ecosystems there have been disrupted by the introduction of zebra mussels, native to Russian waters. They were first discovered in the Great Lakes in the 1980s and have spread quickly since then. I once worked with a team of aquatic scientists to analyze the effects of zebra mussel introduction to the Seneca River. See the Notes and Sources section for a full attribution.

A green iguana in Puerto Rico. Note the dewlap and beady eyes. They have a third eye, a parietal eye, in the center of their forehead.

Once an introduced species is identified as invasive, i.e., causing ecological and economic damages, the question of management and controls comes up. This has often proved difficult. Consider the case of the lamprey in the Great Lakes. The lamprey (which is a fish, not an eel) was introduced into the Great Lakes (and Lake Champlain, and the Finger Lakes in New York) sometime in the early twentieth century. This ugly fish swims upstream to breed; after two or three years, the adults emerge and swim downstream into the lakes. Their mouths are adapted to stick onto a prey fish and eat through the skin until it can suck blood and other body fluids from the host fish.

Lake trout with two parasitic lampreys. The lampreys will ultimately kill the trout. They will then search for another host fish.

The population of lampreys exploded after their introduction and as a consequence, the numbers of commercially important fish like the lake trout dropped. Management efforts (use of lampricides, placement of nets to prevent upstream migration to spawn) reduced their population and the population of lake trout rebounded but not to pre-lamprey levels. The case of the lamprey illustrates one important fact in invasive species management: the intruder’s population might be reduced by various means, but it is next to impossible to achieve complete eradication. There will thus continue to be Burmese pythons in the Everglades, lampreys in the Great Lakes, and purple loose strife in wet meadows and marshes in the northeastern US.

Graph of lamprey population estimates (red line) and lake trout population estimates (blue line). Note the shifts in population after management techniques were implemented.

So is there a management strategy for the iguanas in Puerto Rico? Maybe. It turns out that iguanas are edible, and in fact, in some countries are known as “chickens of the trees.” In Honduras, for example, iguanas are hunted and their population is dwindling. The Puerto Rico government has assisted a start-up business to slaughter iguanas and sell the meat to countries, like Honduras, where iguanas are a food source. The initial goal was 2,000 lbs of iguana meat a week.

How do you cook iguana? Here is one recipe.

Iguana can also be served fried, stewed, curried, boiled, or pretty much any way you can cook chicken. It is said to taste a bit like chicken but with the consistency of crab meat.

There are rumors here in Puerto Rico that sometimes iguana meat replaces chicken in some local recipes. It is rumored that, while you think you’re eating chicken on a skewer (pincho de pollo) it might actually be pincho de iguana.

Skewers of chicken (pinchos de pollo). Or are they pinchos de iguana?

Is this why the numbers of iguanas seem to be decreasing? I don’t know, but I’m going to be real careful the next time I think of having a pincho de pollo.

Notes and Sources: See Wikipedia entries for Green Iguana, Lamprey, Godzilla, Hemlock Woolly Adelgid, Emerald Ash Borer, and Zebra Mussel for more information.

The iquana recipe is from www.cooks.com – search for iguana recipes. I haven’t tried this one yet.

The lake trout image is from Wikimedia Commons. The original link is http://www.nwrc.usgs.gov/world/images/lamprey.jpg

The Godzilla image is a poster advertising the 2014 movie of that name. The poster art copyright is believed to belong to the distributor of the film, Warner Bros., the publisher of the film or the graphic artist.

The zebra mussel paper I referred to is Water Quality Impacts and Indicators of Metabolic Activity of the Zebra Mussel Invasion of the Seneca River, published June 2007 in the JAWRA Journal of the American Water Resources Association. The authors were Steven W. Effler, David A. Matthews, Carol M. Brooks-Matthews, MaryGail Perkins, Clifford A. Siegfried and James M. Hassett

February 2017

            There was a minor lunar eclipse visible here the other night. We observed it walking to the Old San Juan bus station after listening to a woodwind quintet (flute, clarinet, oboe, English horn and bassoon) in one of the city’s many plazas. The mega yacht Eclipse is in port. If anyone on the yacht had been interested, they would have had a good view of the lunar eclipse. They would have missed the quintet though. Their loss.

I wonder if the two events are related. Do they show Russian attempts to meddle in solar system affairs? These sorts of questions keep me awake at night.

The Eclipse is the second largest privately owned yacht yet built. It is said to have an anti-missile warning system, an armored cabin, and a laser system to interfere with paparazzi’s cameras. I took the image at the top of the page; the system must not have activated. She was built by the Bloom + Voss shipyard in Hamburg, where, prior to World War II, the battleship Bismarck was built. More recently, the shipyard built the super yacht A. (See my earlier posts about A).

Eclipse is 533 feet long and displaces 13,000 tons. By comparison, a US Navy Arleigh Burke class guided missile destroyer is 504 feet long, and displaces about 9,800 tons. The Eclipse was designed by the naval architecture firm Francis Design; the exterior and interior were designed by Terence Tisdale Design. She carries a crew of about 70, a three-person submarine, three landing boats. Her guests use 23 guest cabins, three swimming pools (one can be converted to a dance floor), several hot tubs, a disco hall, and two helicopter pads. At an estimated $1.5 billion, she cost about as much as an Arleigh Burke destroyer. And they, to the best of my knowledge, don’t have hot tubs.

The USS Arleigh Burke, a guided missile destroyer that costs about as much as the Eclipse.

Eclipse was launched in 2009 and is registered in Bermuda. She is listed for charters through SuperYachtsMonaco, although this may be a tax dodge since charter yachts are exempt from European property tax. The Eclipse comes to the Caribbean each winter to pick up guests arriving at the international airport in St, Martin. She then travels to the owner’s estate on nearby St. Bart, close to St. Martin and about 150 miles east of Puerto Rico. By the way, St. Barts is one of five French overseas collectives and as such is a French state with representation in the French legislature. The Euro is the official currency there, as it is on the French side of St. Martin.

The Russian multibillionaire Roman Arkadyevich Abramovich (born 1966) owns Eclipse. For all his money, Abramovich had a rather modest start, selling imported rubber duckies with his first wife, Olga, from a Moscow apartment. I wonder if his business was in anyway connected with the release of 28,800 yellow rubber duckies and other floatable bathtub toys in the Pacific. That was the result of a container ship accident and is documented in Moby Duck, by Donovan Hohn, which was a New York Times notable book of the year, in 2011.

Roman Abramovich, Russian multibillionaire and owner of Eclipse.

Abramovich’s horizons soon broadened, aided by perestroika, which lead to the privatization of Russian state-owned enterprises. After forays into several small businesses in the early 1990s, (body guard recruitment, doll manufacture, tire retreading), he, together with entrepreneur Boris Berezovsky, purchased controlling interests in the Russian oil company Sibfnet, in 1995. It is alleged they, by means of bribes and other forms of persuasion, bought the company for far less than the market value. They each paid US$100 million for a company whose net worth was estimated to be US$2.7 billion. They both turned their purchase into multibillion dollar profits. Their purchase was no doubt assisted by then Russian Prime Minister Boris Yeltsin, who invited Abramovich and his family to live in a Kremlin apartment.

Abramovich had a falling out with Beresovsky when , in 2000, Abramovich gained 100% interest in Several Russian aluminum mines and smelters and formed Rusal, the world’s largest aluminum company. Beresovsky felt he had been cheated by Abramovich during the so called Russian aluminum wars, and responded with a multibillion dollar lawsuit heard in a London court. The case was dismissed in August 2012, after the High Court judge found Berezovsky to be “an unimpressive, and inherently unreliable witness, who regarded truth as a transitory, flexible concept, which could be moulded to suit his current purposes”, whereas Abramovich was seen as “a truthful, and on the whole reliable, witness”.

The aluminum wars did not keep Abramovich away from politics. In 1999, he was elected governor of the remote Russian province of Chukotka, in far western Siberia, just across the Bering Strait from Alaska. Given their close proximity, I wonder if he and Sarah Palin got to know each other. Abramovich, unlike Palin, showed a philanthropic streak as he donated an estimated US$1.3 billion to various projects there.

Abramovich has been a close confidant of Vladimir Putin. He recommended to Yeltsin, in 1999, that Putin be his successor as the Russian president, and interviewed each candidate for a cabinet post in Putin’s government. Chris Hutchins, a Putin biographer, states that Putin treats Abramovich like a favorite son. His influence on Putin presumably continues to this day.

Vladimir Putin, good friend of Roman Abramovich, owner of the Eclipse.

Outside of Russia, Abramovich is known as the owner of the Chelsea F.C., a team in the English premier soccer league. Abramovich purchased the company that owns the football club in 2003 and immediately embarked upon a program to bring Chelsea to the same international prominence as Manchester United and Real Madrid.

Chelsea finished their first season under the new ownership in second place, up from fourth the previous year. Abramovich rules Chelsea as George Steinbrenner once ruled the New York Yankees, with expensive free agents, frequent changes in managers, and success on the field.

So there, in a nutshell, is the owner of Eclipse, which left port the day before yesterday. I wonder how much Russian influence she left behind.

Notes and Sources: See Wikipedia entries for Yacht Eclipse, Roman Abramovich, Russian aluminum wars, Vladimir Putin, and Chukotka.

The image of the USS Arleigh Burke is by Petty Officer 1st Class RJ Stratchko – https://www.dvidshub.net/image/1023190.

Moby Duck: The True Story of 28.800 Bath Toys Lost at Sea & of the Beachcombers, Oceanographers, Environmentalists & Fools Including the Author Who Went in Search of Them by Donovan Hohn is a worthy read. I enjoyed it immensely.

A new governor was sworn in just after midnight on January 2, 2017. This marks a new chapter in the complex US – Puerto Rican relationship.

Governor Ricardo Rossello of the Partido Nuevo Progresista (PNP- New Progressive Party) replaced Alejandro Garcia Padilla of the Partido Popular Democrático  (PPD – Popular Democratic Party). Padilla chose not to run for reelection. Historically, the PNP has been pro-statehood and loosely associated with the mainland Republican party. The PPD, loosely associated with the Democrats, has been pro-commonwealth. There is a pro-independence party (Partida Independentista Puertorriqueño, PIP) but it receives too few votes to be registered in general elections.

The inauguration is a day long celebration. People travel from around the island to attend. They gather at the Capitol and along the route to La Fortalezza, the governor’s mansion. After addressing both houses of the legislature, the governor and his family, in accordance with long-standing tradition, walk from the Capitol to the mansion. As you can imagine, this is a challenge for the security detail.

Security was evident everywhere. There were patrol boats off shore, just to the north of the Capitol. Motorcycle police where everywhere. Helicopters and drones kept an eye on things from above. And former US Presidents kept a watchful eye on the proceedings.

Motorcycle police and patrol boats were part of the security detail.

A police helicopter and two or three drones kept an eye on things.

Presidents Obama, Johnson, and Kennedy watch the inauguration from the south side of the Capitol.

The procession started from the north side of the Capitol, passed the south side of Castillo San Cristobal, wound around Plaza Colon, and then headed up Calle Fortalezza to the mansion. A group of students from an arts high school in Bayamon provided entertainment. They were dressed in period costumes and performed Puerto Rican dances, some with a distinct Afro-Caribbean flavor, There were four cruise ships in port; the visitors must have been impressed as they kept asking to have their pictures taken with students.

The procession passed in front of Castillo San Cristobal and then went up Calle Fortalezza to the governor’s residence.

High school students in period costumes provided entertainment and provided a photo-op for cruise ship passengers.

The procession began with a 21 gun salute from 105 mm howitzers on the north side of the Capitol. I knew the Governor was getting close when the TV truck showed up. He greeted and mingled with the crowd along the way. That must have given the security detail apoplexy.

Howitzers fired a salute to start the procession. TV crews captured the event. The Governor mingled with the crowd, many of whom joined him in the precession.

Governor Rossello’s first actions demonstrate his interest in statehood for Puerto Rico. He asked his government’s Resident Counselor (a non-voting member of Congress representing Puerto Rican interests) to introduce a bill in the House of Representatives to start the statehood process. He stated he would conduct an island-wide referendum with two choices: statehood or independence. There will be no option for an improved Commonwealth status. And he promised to hold an election to help force the issue, the Tennessee Gambit.

Now, the US Constitution is not very clear as to the process for a new state to join the union. Congress is given the authority in Article IV, Section s, clause 2:  “The Congress shall have Power to dispose of and make all needful Rules and Regulations respecting the Territory or other Property belonging to the United States…”

Typically, Congress has adopted the following steps:

• The territory holds a referendum to determine the people’s desire for or against statehood.
• If a majority votes for statehood, the territory petitions Congress
• Both the House and the Senate agree to statehood via a simple majority vote.
• The President signs the resolution granting statehood.

So, Governor Rossello has started the process by asking for a referendum and petitioning Congress for a statehood resolution. He plans on more. The population of Puerto Rico is about 3.5 million, roughly the same as Connecticut. Puerto Rico would thus become the 29th or 30th most populous state. The Nutmeg State has, like all states, two senators, and, apportioned by population, five congressional districts; Puerto Rico would have the same number of representatives. Governor Rossello proposes to create five congressional districts and hold elections for two senators and five representative prior to statehood, a move seen here as designed to force the issue in Washington. This tactic has been called, here in Puerto Rico, the Tennessee gambit.

This may not work. Tennessee elected two senators before being admitted to the union, but the US Senate did not recognize them.  William Blount and William Cocke had to be reelected after statehood was granted, on July 1, 1796. Andrew Jackson was elected the state’s lone representative, but only after statehood had been granted.

By the way, it cannot be said that Rossello won a ringing endorsement for his plans. In a four way race, he won 42% of the vote. His closest rival, from the PPD, won about 38% of the vote, with the remainder going to two candidates representing minor parties.

These are interesting times here in Puerto Rico. Of course, they are also interesting on the mainland. Stay tuned.

Sources: See Wikipedia entries for Tennessee statehood, US States’ populations, and various news stories.

San Juan has wonderful events during the holiday season – concerts, tree lightings, visits from Santa. The annual parade of yachts from the marina and around the harbor is a major part of the season. Families crowd into Old San Juan for the event, Many stay for food and drink and make an evening of it.

The yachts start leaving the marina just before dark, and travel down the channel in single file, led by a Coast Guard ship. They pass two cruise ships getting ready for their weekly departure. The passengers must have a great view of the armada as it passes by.

The parade of yachts begins just as it is getting dark. They travel by two cruise ships as the move down the channel to the bay.

The yachts are led by a Coast Guard vessel.

The parade route takes the single file of yachts into the main bay, where they turn back towards the marina. One their return, they pass close – 20 to 30 feet – to the shore of the Urban Bahia, San Juan’s waterfront park. This is the best viewing location. Families come with folding chair and coolers and stake out a place along the railing. The thousands of viewers are in a festive mood; I heard several spontaneous renditions of Feliz Naviad, in both Spanish and English.

The yachts are elaborately decorated and they make for an impressive sight. Here are a few of the 75 or so yachts in the parade.

As you can see, the yacht owners invest a good deal of time and thought into their decorative schemes.

All in all, a fun night. I’ll describe other aspects of Christmas in San Juan in a subsequent post. In the meantime, happy holidays to all!

Two ships from the Royal Netherlands Navy were in port the other day, docked at Pier 18. The port call was presumably a friendly visit, but that has not always been the case. The Dutch invaded Puerto Rico in 1625 and almost took the island. The Netherlands, like other European naval powers, have a long history in the Caribbean.

The Dutch Navy dates from the Eighty Years’ War (1568 – 1648), also known as the Dutch War of Independence. The seventeen Dutch provinces revolted against the political and religious rule of Philip II of Spain, who was the sovereign over the Habsburg Netherlands. The Dutch forces, led by William the Silent, eventually defeated the Spanish. In 1581, they formed the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands, the existence of which was codified in the Peace of Westphalia, in 1648.

The Dutch invested in their navy and soon became a world power, challenging especially the English, but also the French and Spanish navies for trade and overseas possessions. It was during this period that pejorative terms – Dutch courage (fueled by alcohol), Dutch cap (contraceptive diaphragm), Dutch wife (prostitute), Dutch concert (uproar from a drunken crowd) – entered the English language. Some phrases are still current – Dutch date, Dutch treat, Dutch uncle, for example.

The Dutch, like other European naval powers, recognized the strategic importance of Puerto Rico. The Enchanted Isle is the first island sailing ships from Europe, traveling on the trade winds, encounter with both ample fresh water and an excellent harbor. The Spanish had recognized this early on and had begun to fortify the harbor area by constructing El Morro, the iconic fortress at the harbor entrance. In fact, San Juan is one of only seven cities in the New World the Spanish considered important enough to fortify.

The Dutch arrived off San Juan on September 24, 1625, with an armada of 17 ships and 2,000 men. The Dutch took advantage of favorable winds and forced their way into the harbor. The Spanish cannons at El Morro were in poor repair, and the cannoneers ill-prepared. The Dutch commander, know to history as Captain Boudewijn Hendricksz or Boudoyno Henrico or Balduino Enrico, demanded a surrender from Juan de Haros, the Spanish Governor. He refused, and the Dutch invaded at La Puntilla, the site of the current US Coast Guard station in San Juan Bay.  de Haros recognized the threat and ordered San Juan evacuated. He commanded Captain Juan de Amezquita with 300 men to defend the island from El Morro. He also ordered former governor Juan de Vargas to lead the island’s militia against the Dutch.

El Morro from the vantage point of a Dutch attacker. The Dutch had to attack uphill, across an open field, all the time under fire from cannon and muskets. I edited the image to remove modern features. See the image below.

The Dutch took possession of San Juan on September 25, 1625, and established their headquarters in Fortaleza, the governor’s mansion. Their attacks on El Morro were unsuccessful, and they also suffered attacks from the militia. After a siege of about a month, the Dutch were driven from the island by a series of counterattacks. They fled after setting fire to the city and looting the cathedral, The Spanish victory is depicted in a  painting by Eugenio Caxes, the royal artist for Philip III. The painting was completed shortly after the battle and is currently on display at the Museo del Prado in Madrid.

Spanish soldiers and Puerto Rican militia drive Dutch invaders back to the sea. Governor Juan de Haro and Captain Juan de Amezqitas are in the foreground. Reproduction of painting by Eugenio Caxes, royal painter for Philip III. The reproduction is on signage on the way into El Morro. The sign is quite faded; I enhanced the colors in Photoshop.

The Spanish learned that San Juan could be defended from an attack, and that the island’s militia could be trusted in the defense of Spanish interests. The Dutch, however, did capture a Spanish fleet on its way to the Iberian peninsula. That, and the near defeat in San Juan, caused the Spanish to rethink the defense of their empire. Money was allocated to make San Juan a more readily defensible walled city. Construction began in 1630 and, with various fits and starts, was completed in 1780.

El Morro as it looks today. The small obelisk at the far left was placed in 1925, 300 years after the battle.

The Netherlands governs six islands in the Lesser Antilles. Three – Aruba, Curacao, and Sint Maarten are countries in the Netherlands, with the Netherlands being the fourth and largest constituent country in the Kingdom. The other three – Bonaire, Sint Eustatius, and Saba – are special municipalities of the Netherlands alone. As shown on the map below, three of these islands are in the Leeward Islands, and three in the Leeward Antilles. The Windward and Leeward designation comes from the days of sail; the reasons for these designations merits its own post.

Map of the Caribbean Sea. Saba and Sint Eustatius are shown but not identified; they are small islands near St. Martin.

The Dutch thus have good reason for a naval presence in the Caribbean. The warship that visited is P840, the HNLMS Holland, one of a class of four offshore patrol vessels constructed for the Royal Netherlands Navy. They fulfill patrol and intervention tasks against smugglers and other lightly armed adversaries. They carry one helicopter, flown from the rear deck. The main armament is an Otto Melara Super Rapid gun which can fire 76 mm rounds at 120 rounds per minute at a range of about 10 miles.

The HLNMS Holland, a Dutch navy patrol vessel.

The second ship is the HNLMS Pelikaan (A804), a logistics support ship permanently based at Curacao. She is used primarily for humanitarian relief efforts. I wonder if she is here from Haiti. The Pelikaan was the first ship there after the 2010 earthquake.

The HMLNS Pelikaan, a Dutch naval logistics ship.

I’m glad the Dutch came in peace this time. The main gun on the Holland could have done a real number on our balcony furniture.

Notes and sources. See Wikipedia articles on the Royal Netherlands Navy, the Dutch invasion of Puerto Rico, Eugenio Caxes, and the Netherlands in the Caribbean for more information.

I downloaded the map of the Caribbean, created by Kmusser, from Wikimedia Commons. It is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported  agreement,