Soot from Riverton fire affecting residents

Residents of Portmore are appealing to the alleged arsonist(s) to stop setting fire to the Riverton City landfill in St Andrew.

For the umpteenth time, residents were inconvenienced and their health compromised by smoke from the landfill which burnt for days.

Thick smoke was seen in sections of Gregory Park, Cumberland, Independence City and other areas within the Sunshine City.

One motorist said: "I was driving along Grange Lane (an entrance road to Portmore), minutes to eight o'clock this morning (Wednesday), and I could not see the sun because of the smoke." The motorist said that this caused poor visibility on the roadway but thankfully she got to her destination safely.

The smoke also caused teachers and students to become uneasy in schools. From early as minutes after 8 a.m. smoke hovered over parts of Independence City.

health concerns

One teacher said she is concerned about the health of her students.

"I'm especially concerned about the children who are asthmatic or have other breathing problems," she said.

One resident in Gregory Park, Mark Green, said: "Mi tired a it. How much time people a go light Riverton City dump, and a jus' cause bear discomfat. Mi a really wonder if dem can do something fe stop de arsonist dem from light the rubbish and stop smoke up people in a Portmore."

The circumstances which led to the landfill being set ablaze is not known but according to reports, it was lit just after midday on Monday.

When contacted, Joan Gordon-Webley of the National Solid Waste Management Authority (NSWMA), apologised to the residents of Portmore for the inconvenience.

"I noticed that the wind blew the smoke in that (the Portmore) direction. I apologise to the people of Portmore," she said. She added that the fire, which started about 12:30 p.m. on Monday was under control, and thanked her staff at the NSWMA, the fire department, the Jamaica Defence Force, and the Office of Disaster Preparedness Emergency Management for the all-night work they put in to keep things in check.

She further stated that the constant wetting of the landfill caused the smoke, and it spread in different directions. Assistance from the fire department and the army helped to get things under control.

"This is record time for us to get the fire under control, from mid-day Monday to Friday, four days, the last time it took us two weeks to get the fire under control," she said.

zero tolerance

This latest incident has forced Gordon-Webley to issue a zero-tolerance stand with regard to private trucks using the landfill. She believes that men who do business in scrap metal maybe deliberately setting the landfill on fire to expose the scrap metal that is underneath the garbage.

Once this is done, the men recovert he scrap metal for sale.