COE Director urges population to obey recommendations

National Territory – In view of the rains in different places and forecasts that they will continue, the director of the Emergency Operations Center (COE) Manuel Méndez García, urges the population to remain attentive to the recommendations of civil protection agencies to avoid being surprised by flash floods, flooding of rivers, streams and ravines and landslides.

Méndez García believes that small and fragile boats should refrain from sailing offshore and people from crossing rivers, streams and ravines that have abnormal volumes of water to avoid being swept away.

Due to the forecasts, the COE maintains 14 provinces on alert, 9 of them in yellow: María Trinidad Sánchez, El Seibo, Hermanas Mirabal, Puerto Plata Hato Mayor, Duarte, Espaillat, Samaná La Altagracia; while in green: Santo Domingo, Distrito Nacional, Montecristi, Santiago and La Vega.

Méndez García explains that as weather events approach our area of influence, the COE modifies the alert levels and expands them. It points out that according to the Dominican Institute of Meteorology (INDOMET), the Dominican territory will remain under a humid and unstable environment; The wind will continue to moderate in the northeast and the trough will continue to have an impact.

Due to this, he specifies, weak to moderate rains are expected, being occasionally strong with thunderstorms and gusts of wind towards the provinces mentioned above.

During the night hours, the continuation of the rains is forecast towards provinces near the Atlantic coast.

He said that all the institutions that are part of the COE are ready to take action, if necessary, because this is established by the Contingency Plan by which that body is governed.

He said that there are already brigades of the Civil Defense and other agencies positioned in the places where there have been heavy rains with flooding of rivers and streams that have cut off localities, both in the East and in the North and Northeast of the country.