Home Find Us Our Weather Central America 2005 Mexico 2004 Van. Is. 2002 Alaska 2000 All Videos Kids Corner Our Boat Wisdom Plastic Guest Book Mailing List Contact Us About Us Favorite Links Southbounders

:

Hurricane Adrian
 

Even though El Salvador is supposed to be out of the hurricane zone, late May found us facing the first hurricane of the season and the first hurricane in 80 years to track towards the west coast of El Salvador.  These emails to our friends and family we sent during the storm and the photos below give a fairly good description of our experience.  The actual event turned out not to be a big deal in the end as the storm passed 50 miles to the north of our position with barely hurricane strength.  We only saw wind speeds to 40 knots, but there there was a lot of rain, over 14 inches in 24 hours at our location in Bahia Del Sol.  Mud and land slides inland killed 19 people and the massive amount of rain and runoff draining into the estuary reinforced the ebb tide and caused stronger than normal tidal currents (video).  Here's another video of the strong ebb current at the boat (video).  Note the double anchor chain snubbers rigged on the chain.

As always, click on the images to see a larger view.

 
 

Not a hurricane photo, but still weird! These look like bugs, but they are actually molted shells left behind after the creatures shred their skin.

Hurricane preperation. Spare anchor rigged and ready to go on the foredeck. Note the headsail has been removed from the forstay.

The Hotel Del Sol as viewed from out boat at anchor. The rain was so hard during the strom that we could not see the lights from the hotel!

One of the nearby boats whose owners were away. Many of the cruisers pitched in to secure such vessels for the storm.

Anchorred vessels to the east of us, including a 68ft ketch. The wind would initially come from this direction, so we worried about their proximity.

Vessels to the west of us.

Pre-storm meeting at the hotel, with latest weather information. Contingincy plans were made for injuries and other possibilities.

Kids paid only scant attention to the pending storm, playing in the pool the day before the strom's arrival.

Wind starts to pick up the evening of Adrian's landfall.

The rain begins. This is just the beginning. We could not have a camera in the cockpit during the height of the storm.

The current still has us pointing west even though the wind is building from the east.

Kelsey foudn an outlet for her creativity during the storm and made "hurricane cards", which she sold them after the event.

Puddles left over after all the rain. The interor of the country had bad flooding and deadly landslides.

Building castles made of sand a few days after the storm.

The skies are blue again!

/

Previous Photo Page       Central America 2005 Page      Next Photos 

/b