There is a broken main at the LaVentura Appartments off Washington Boulevard in Kingston. Water is spewing several feet into the air.
NWC will be advised.
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Saturday, 29 August 2026
Alert - NWC Pipeline Break
NWC has a challenge maintaining the schedule of water availability due to breaks in The pipelines and mechanical challenges.
There is another pipeline break on Perkins Boulevard in Kingston. Surrounding areas are now without water. The concern is while consumers are being advised to conserve water, the loss of water due to breaks in the pipelines must be significant.
Let us know if you have water in your area now. Add your information in the comments section at the bottom of the blog.
Minister Samuda and the NWC need to advise the nation what is causing these line breaks and what mitigating actions will be taken.
Please share this post especially in kingston so people will know what is happening. Thanks.
The Damn... Dam Water Crisis Deepens
By Michael Spence
 |
| Michael Spence |
For the Mona Reservoir / Dam in Kingston, there is no single, recent public figure for “how much silt is in it right now.” The National Water Commission (NWC) only reports total water volume, which includes silt. That can be misleading.
1. Current Water Capacity
- According to the last NWC reading on July 14, 2026:
- Total Capacity: 808.5 million gallons / 3,675 megalitres
- Current Storage: 611.8 million gallons = 75.7% full
- Earlier this month, it was reported at 62%.
2. The Silt Problem
When Mona Reservoir was built in 1944, it was designed to hold 809 million gallons, water and silt combined.
It was desilted once, between 1974 and 1976. Officials said that should last 30 years. It’s now 50 years later. Heavy rains since then have washed more mud back in.
Experts estimate silt could now account for 60% or more of Mona’s 808.5 MG capacity. That would leave only about 485 MG of usable water even at “full” capacity.
The more widely discussed silt crisis is at Hermitage Dam. Officials have said Hermitage is “heavily silted.” Even when it reads 100% full, usable water is only about 40% because of silt buildup. The NWC should begin preparatory work for desilting Hermitage.
For Mona, officials have acknowledged that catchment facilities serving the Corporate Area have “capacities undermined by heavy silting.” But they have not published a specific % silt figure for Mona in recent reports.
Bottom Line
The NWC tracks Mona by % full, but that number includes silt, mud, and dirt. Do the math: 75.7% full in mid-July 2026 = 611.8 MG. If 60% of the total capacity is silt, then only 363 MG of that is usable water.
Silt has definitely reduced Mona’s usable volume since 1944. It was bad enough to require desilting in the 1970s. Today, the exact amount of silt accumulated is not being reported.
This is the damn dam problem: decades of accumulated silt cut into the amount of usable water available from both Mona and Hermitage.
Action is needed and soon to address this damn dam crisis.
Michael Spence
Michael Spence is a graduate of Cornwall College and the University of the West Indies. He is a trained teacher, a sociologist, and a writer for Bark Di Trute.
Micspen2@hotmail.com
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Updates On Flooding In India
This is now day four since that major disaster in India. More than 600 people were killed in floods in Nepal, which destroyed many homes. Some 2426 people are still missing. The missing include over 500 foreigners.
There are further risks of landslides, so rescuers have to make the best use of the time when the weather has improved.
Report From BBC
BBC speaks with US group after 77 trekkers go missing in Nepal flood
The BBC's North America Correspondent Helena Humphrey visited the Isha Foundation, a non-profit spiritual organization in McMinnville, Tennessee, that lost contact with 77 trek participants on the China-Nepal border. The group, made up of people from several countries, was travelling in the region that was hit by the massive flash-flood of 26 August.
Humphrey spoke with Isha community liaison Leslie Crispi about how the organization is coping with a tragedy unfolding thousands of miles away in the Himalayas. Crispi, who has completed the pilgrimage herself, described it as a life-changing spiritual experience for many participants.
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Keep abreast of the news and information in the world. Bark Di Trute, a Jamaican blog, is packed with accurate information. Click the following link and get information at your fingertips. WhatsApp link is: https://chat.whatsapp.com/C9bkP96JIN2JgHiuktY3Jj
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Without your support, Bark Di Trute could fail to bark one day. Send your ideas, stories, and news by WhatsApp at (876) 816-5261.
You can view the blog on your computer at https://vderby.blogspot.com, and you will be able to see the various links. For example, there is a link that takes you to the calendar to see what is happening on the weekend. You can even search the site for articles. There is also a weather link, which you can use to track hurricanes.
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Weather Update - August 29, 2026
Report from the National Hurricane Centre
Heavy rains from the remnants of Dolly could affect the Leeward Islands late Saturday into Sunday with possible impacts in the Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, and Hispaniola Sunday and Monday. This heavy rain may produce flash flooding within areas of higher terrain of the Leeward Islands.
During the past few hours, the center of Dolly passed just north of NOAA buoy 41041, which did not observe any westerly winds. Examination of high-resolution satellite imagery also does not readily indicate any westerly winds south of the center. Based on this, Dolly has become an open tropical wave, with the initial and forecast positions being that of the vorticity maximum. The initial intensity remains 40 mph (35 knots), with those winds occurring north of the vorticity center.
The system is moving 280/22 knots, and this motion should continue for the next 24 hours. After that time, a general westward to west-northwestward motion with a slight decrease in forward speed should take the remnants of Dolly near the Leeward Island Saturday night or Sunday, and near Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands by Sunday afternoon or Sunday night. A continued west-northwestward motion is expected after that, with the remnants moving through the Greater Antilles or the Bahamas during the early part of next week.
The system is currently in a hostile environment with significant southwesterly shear and dry air. These conditions should continue for at least the next 2–3 days, and the remnants should slowly weaken during this time. The official forecast shows 24 hours of points where the maximum winds are at tropical-storm force and there is a well-defined vorticity center. After that, the winds are expected to decrease below 40 mph (35 knots), and the system center is expected to become less well-defined. Some global models hint at the possibility that Dolly could regenerate in several days, but at this time there is poor agreement on where and when this might occur. Should conditions warrant, further information regarding the potential redevelopment of the remnants of Dolly will be provided in subsequent Tropical Weather Outlooks.
General
Today, it's partly cloudy with afternoon showers or thunderstorms. High 92F. Winds SE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 40%.
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Prostate Cancer
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Keep abreast of the news and information in the world. Bark Di Trute, a Jamaican blog, is packed with accurate information. Click the following link and get information at your fingertips. WhatsApp link is: https://chat.whatsapp.com/C9bkP96JIN2JgHiuktY3Jj
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It's best to view this blog on your computer at https://vderby.blogspot.com.
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Without your support, Bark Di Trute could fail to bark one day. Send your ideas, stories, and news by WhatsApp at (876) 816-5261.
You can view the blog on your computer at https://vderby.blogspot.com, and you will be able to see the various links. For example, there is a link that takes you to the calendar to see what is happening on the weekend. You can even search the site for articles. There is also a weather link, which you can use to track hurricanes.
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Drug Demand Pushing The Drugs
By Michael Spence
|
| Michael Spence |
Jamaica does not have a drug problem. We have a transit problem caused by someone else’s addiction.
Those big drug arrests you read about will never end it. Mark my word. I bet every single shipment seized was destined for American and European consumers, not for Jamaicans.
I heard it myself on Jamaica television in the 1980s. Prime Minister Edward Seaga, the only PM with the guts to say it straight, told a U.S. president:
“Jamaicans do not love drugs. Americans love drugs. Jamaicans don’t love drugs; they love the money Americans are willing to pay for it.” That statement is still true today.
It is America and Europe that turn Jamaica into a scapegoat for their problem. It is their demand, their drug-loving subculture, that funds the boats, the planes, and the corruption that follow.
So to Washington and Brussels: OBLITERATE THE DRUG ADDICTION AT HOME. Stop harassing small countries like Jamaica for a crisis you created.
To Jamaicans: Understand this. Ignore the demand, no matter how tempting the money is. JUST SAY NO TO THEIR DRUGS. JUST SAY NO TO THEIR MONEY. JUST SAY NO TO THEIR DEMAND.
To our law enforcement: Do not be entrapped by drug-money affairs. Save yourselves, your families, and this country the shame and embarrassment that comes with it.
America: GO SOLVE YOUR DRUG-LOVING PROBLEM. LEAVE JAMAICA ALONE. Then we can work together as real partners.
And if anyone still has contact with the straight-talking Edward Seaga, tell him some of us remember, and we still agree.
Michael Spence
Michael Spence is a graduate of Cornwall College and the University of the West Indies. He is a trained teacher, a sociologist, and a writer for Bark Di Trute.
Micspen2@hotmail.com
________________
Prostate Cancer
Remember to have your prostate checked out by the doctor, or you might see your maker earlier than he had planned.
Please add your comments at the bottom of the blog.
________________
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| Click Here. |
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Keep abreast of the news and information in the world. Bark Di Trute, a Jamaican blog, is packed with accurate information. Click the following link and get information at your fingertips. WhatsApp link is: https://chat.whatsapp.com/C9bkP96JIN2JgHiuktY3Jj
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It's best to view this blog on your computer at https://vderby.blogspot.com.
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Subscribe Now!
Without your support, Bark Di Trute could fail to bark one day. Send your ideas, stories, and news by WhatsApp at (876) 816-5261.
You can view the blog on your computer at https://vderby.blogspot.com, and you will be able to see the various links. For example, there is a link that takes you to the calendar to see what is happening on the weekend. You can even search the site for articles. There is also a weather link, which you can use to track hurricanes.
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Squatting Has Solutions - Don't Wait For The Bomb
By Michael Spence
|
| Michael Spence |
I read it all. I lived through it too. That "fashionable socialist era."
The "Socialist Lyrical Era" produced a Michael Manley who talked socialism but had no Marxist-Leninist framework or real plan. He lacked the courage to govern Jamaica as a socialist state because it would have meant taking on a revolution: 2% owning 95% of the land vs. 98% who were landless, many homeless, and squatting.
Mass squatting started at emancipation in 1838. 450,000-plus ex-slaves got freedom but no land. Most of us descend from those people and from squatters, some of whom were here before the British.
My community, Bethel Town in Eastern Westmoreland, shows another way. It was a free village.
Baptist Rev. Phillipo in 1837, bought 200 acres and sold ¼ and ½ acre lots for £10, paid from a £10/month plantation wage. Kew Park, Woodstock, and Hermitage still exist. That’s why SE Westmoreland had little squatting. Solution: give people legal, livable space. Adapt the Phillipo model.
- Jamaica = 2.7M acres. Crown = 1.08M acres.
- Give 1M squatters ¼ acre each = 250,000 acres. 830,000 acres of Crown land remain.
- We could even do 2.25 square chains with community services built in.
- Manley missed it. And in 2026, we still have no plan.
Now the Trespass Act stands, and since June 9, 2026, new Crown land squatters can’t be regularised. That’s a dangerous road.
Coopers Pen has become entertainment for some, even journalists. This is also why Jamaica sits at the bottom of Caribbean GDP per capita poverty. Haiti is #1. Are we #2 now?
Squatting has a solution. Don’t wait for the "Squatter Time Bomb" to explode— or for someone to suggest prison, squatters' erasure, or deportation as the answer.
Michael Spence
Michael Spence is a graduate of Cornwall College and the University of the West Indies. He is a trained teacher, a sociologist, and a writer for Bark Di Trute.
Micspen2@hotmail.com
Prostate Cancer
Remember to have your prostate checked out by the doctor, or you might see your maker earlier than he had planned.
Please add your comments at the bottom of the blog.
________________
|
| Click Here. |
______________________
Keep abreast of the news and information in the world. Bark Di Trute, a Jamaican blog, is packed with accurate information. Click the following link and get information at your fingertips. WhatsApp link is: https://chat.whatsapp.com/C9bkP96JIN2JgHiuktY3Jj
_________________
_________________
It's best to view this blog on your computer at https://vderby.blogspot.com.
_________________
_________________
Subscribe Now!
Without your support, Bark Di Trute could fail to bark one day. Send your ideas, stories, and news by WhatsApp at (876) 816-5261.
You can view the blog on your computer at https://vderby.blogspot.com, and you will be able to see the various links. For example, there is a link that takes you to the calendar to see what is happening on the weekend. You can even search the site for articles. There is also a weather link, which you can use to track hurricanes.
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