Tropical Storm Nate, Costa Rica - October 2017

On Wednesday, October 4, 2017, Costa Rica was slammed by tropical storm Nate. At our house, we experienced strong winds and rain, rain and more rain overnight and all of Friday. Fortunately, we only experienced some water ingress into our house and flooded areas and mud outside. Water was surging down the road and the drainage ditches. It sounded like we lived next to a river. Our electricity and internet stayed on. Much of the rest of the country fared much worse. By Saturday, the storm had headed north and the sun came out.

Rivers were overflowing banks; houses were destroyed and families uprooted; schools were closed; roads and bridges were damaged and destroyed; farms and plantations are under water; roads were closed and many areas were/still are without electricity.

At our property, the total rainfall for the first seven days of October, 2017, was more than the rainfall in all of October of last year:

        First seven days of October 2017 = 13.29”/33.76cm. 

        All of October 2016 = 12.83”/32.59cm.

October is the rainiest month on the Pacific side and the driest month on the Caribbean side.

On October 6, the online newspaper AM Costa Rica reported at least six dead, 377,000 people without water, and 7,000 in emergency shelters. Deaths were attributed to landslides, falling trees and car accidents.

Lance prepared this chart:

Here are a few pictures taken around our house:

Blocking the back door to keep water out - sort of works!

Flooding at the front.

Lance reading the rain gauge.

Mud, mud, mud.

I also made a short video on Saturday showing the drainage ditches outside our property. You can see why they are built so deep. That is our Cat snooping around.