Blaze guts Manchester home restored months after Hurricane Melissa

Edgar Woodburn, 67, had devoted months to repairing his dwelling in Newport, Mandeville, Manchester, after Hurricane Melissa wrecked it last October, and believed he was hours away from moving home again. Instead, the property burned to the ground the night before he was due to resume living there, leaving him struggling to absorb the loss.

“Mi nuh doing well at all. This just unreal and mi can’t believe,” Woodburn told THE STAR yesterday.

He said he had stayed elsewhere throughout the renovation, which had just been finished. “Mi leff down a di house bout 7 yesterday (Sunday) morning because mi carry mi girlfriend go show har di place. Mi nuh sleep a di house, so mi never go back until mi get di call,” he said.

Later that day he learned his effort had been wiped out. “Is a phone call mi get seh di house a bun down. Somebody tell mi seh it start around 8:30,” he said.

The fire consumed the entire two-bedroom structure — living and dining rooms, kitchen, bathroom and verandah. “Everything gone. Documents, clothes, furniture. Nothing nuh save,” Woodburn lamented.

The blow cuts deeper because he had invested heavy work and his own money to put the building back together after Melissa. “Mi push and work so hard fi get back pon mi foot with rebuilding after Hurricane Melissa. Mi just fix back di ceiling fi mi room and di verandah, and di hall ceiling mi did plan fi do next. Mi all buy di material fi finish and dem bun up. Everything bun up. Now it’s like mi a start life all over again after mi work so hard,” he said.

At first he refused to accept that his home was ablaze. “Mi friend call me and tell me seh mi house a burn dung. Mi run him weh a seh nothing like that because mi pass deh and nothing like that,” he said. “Mi move anyways and rush go look. When mi reach round a di front part a di house and look down di gully, a pure black mi see.”

Even on arrival, the scale of the ruin was slow to sink in. “When mi see seh di house really a bun down me shock. All mi haffi say a ‘Jah know.’ But yuh know when mi halla? This morning when mi go dung deh and really see di destruction,” he said yesterday.