34 PEOPLE, INCLUDING RIING STARS WINNER, CAMEAL DAV IS, RESCUED FROM BOG WALK GORGE

                                                          By Baldwin S. A. Howe

  On Thursday, October 29, it was either sheer luck or divine intervention led a team of Special constables, namely, Patrick Jones, Everton King, Renaldo Davis, Rohan Daley and lone female member of the group, Charmaine Archer; on to the Bog Walk Gorge Road, in St. Catherine .  On that day, a deluge, which started from the night before caused the banks of the Rio Cobre River to overflow its banks to flood the Bog Walk Gorge. 

The floodwaters trapped the officers and their vehicle on the road along with other motorists.  Included among the trapped vehicles was a bus with 30 people aboard including the current Digicel Rising Stars winner Cameal Davis.  The floodwaters held the motorists prisoners on the Bog Walk Road for over 5 hours.

The municipal Police officers, who arrived on the scene later, discovered that all the vehicles on the road was trapped by the ever-rising floodwaters, In quickly assessing the situation they proceeded to take steps to organize a rescue operation.  This they hurriedly did with the assistance of a group of men from the Bog Walk area.  The team’s galvanized effort assisted the trapped motorists to get to safer and higher ground.

The Digicel Rising Stars winner, Cameal Davis, and the other 29 passengers and the driver who was travelling to Montego Bay on a public passenger vehicle were very relieved when at 3:30 p.m. help finally arrived.    The rescue team showed up and eventually piloted them to safety, taking them in the opposite direction across the now, almost submerged Flat Bridge.

The total number of people rescued by the gallant makeshift rescue team of Police and the members of the Bog Walk citizenry amounts to 34 in all.  And were the other motorists who were also trapped on the Bog Walk Gorge by the raging floodwaters.