Brandon Usher
2A
Hurricane Hattie
September 19th 2014
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Table of Content
Introduction ----------------------- Page 3
Description-------------------------- Page 4
Major Events after Hurricane Hattie and How it Changed Lives
of People --------------------------- Page 5
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INTRODUCTION
This project will be dealing with the strongest and deadliest tropical cyclone of the 1961
Atlantic Hurricane Season, Hurricane Hattie, which reached the peak of a Category Five. Mr.
Rudulfo Lopez who has been interviewed a few weeks back described it as being one of his
worst experiences. Mr. Lopez was born on November 27th 1925 and has spent his entire life in
Belize City. He was 36 years when Hurricane Hattie made contact and remembers it vividly.
And I quote,” By Friday night 11 pm, I went to Santiago Castillo building for shelter. The
lightning was so strong, that you could have seen up New Road to the police station because of
the bright flashes; by this time water was at 12 feet. The thunder then came and sounded the
entire night making it uneasy to hear.”
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Description
Hurricane Hattie strikes Belize on October 31, 1961, killing more than 400 people and
leaving thousands homeless. This was the second female named hurricane to make landfall in
this country. Almost half of Belize City was demolished by the storm. The storm that would
become Hurricane Hattie had formed two weeks earlier in the Atlantic Ocean and then moved
slowly West toward Central America. The ninth tropical storm, seventh hurricane and major
hurricane of the season, Hattie originated from the area of low pressure and strengthened to a
Category Five. Hattie was first classified as a tropical system on October 27, and actually
developed so quickly that it immediately became a tropical storm. By midnight it had reached
hurricane intensity, continuing northward through the Western Caribbean and grew stronger on
October 28 and 29, posing serious threats to Jamaica, Grand Cayman and western Cuba.
However, on October 29 a ridge to the north turned Hattie toward the northwest, sparing the
Greater Antilles but then threatening Central America. Hattie moved into the Gulf of Honduras
on October 30 as a Category 4 storm with winds of 132 mph, curving then toward the southwest.
Hattie had attained winds of 160 mph and was located about 190 miles east of the border of
Mexico and British Honduras. Hattie at that stage had reached the equivalence of a Category 5
hurricane. Tracking on a direct path to British Honduras Hattie hit the coast from midnight to 3
a.m. on Halloween, which was a Tuesday on October 31, 1961. With recorded winds of 160
mph and gusts of up to 200 mph, the storm surge reached 13-15 feet above tide level. Taking the
first brunt of the storm was the Turneffe Islands, Caye Caulker and Ambergris Caye, followed by
Belize City and the Stann Creek District.
In Belize, with a population of over 31,000 persons at that time, 40% of all buildings
were completely destroyed and another 25 to 35% were severely damaged. Hattie first affected
the southwestern Caribbean, where it produced hurricane winds and caused deaths. While
turning west, Hattie dropped heavy rainfall and the country of Belize, at the time was known as
British Honduras, and sustained the worst damages of the hurricane. Belize City was buffeted by
strong winds and flooded by a powerful storm surge. Hattie’s eye had winds of 115 miles per
hour. The eye passed between Belize City and Dangriga, and was the hurricane that resulted in
George Price and the People’s United Party to relocate their Capital City from Belize City to a
safer location of Belmopan.
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Major Events
Several weeks after the hurricane the Honorable George Cadle Price went to England and
the British Government agreed to supply the finances to build a new capital. The construction
company was comprised of British engineers under the company’s name of Pauling
International. The construction took about three years, while this was happening the Guatemalan
claim for Belize started to agitate. At that time, the then president of Guatemala who was
Ydigoras Funetes who it’s seemed was attempting to bribe the Belizean Representatives in
quietly seceding the territory of Belize.
Taylor-Woodrow International was giving “cost plus contract” from the Sugar Giant Tate
Lyle. By this time around 1967 must of the destroy houses after Hurricane Hattie was either
repaired or rebuilt.
After Hurricane Hattie the British Government allowed Belizeans to oversee the upkeep
of the city. As a result of that, the political parties which were NIP and PUP started to form a
definite agenda in the form of a political manifesto which our present government inherited.
Hurricane Hattie caused many changes to our country. As a result, the demographics of
the population changed sufficiently in that many family members were given visas to go to the
United States and because of such exodus the youth at that time did not receive parental guidance
and correction. This present generation with its gangs and so called turfs is the result.
Economically, Belize had a land of financial boom that many families here in Belize
were receiving money through the mail from Belizeans who were living in the states.
Politically, it changed the lives after the building of a new capital. The Honorable George
Cadle Price visited several American countries in endorsing the Independence of Belize from
British Rule.
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