Sashane Shakes
It’s one thing to be stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic in the busy resort city of Montego Bay but it’s definitely another when you’re stuck in a manhole!
Over the years, many have fallen victim to manholes in the city but the popular hotspot these days is located at the back gate of the Bay City Supermarket adjoining Hart Street.
Beverley Thompson can confirm this as on Wednesday afternoon last week, she had the unfortunate experience of falling into the manhole.
The 58-year-old Jamaica Tours employee had just departed a bus en route to work when she decided to cut through the back of the former Super Plus Supermarket parking lot at Hart Street which leads to Barnett Street.
The moment she reached the gate, she fell into the manhole with no time to scream or shout for help. Instead, the fall, which happened in a mere matter of seconds, saw Thompson shifting most of her weight to her left side while going down in order to prevent serious injuries. But she couldn’t avoid getting hurt all together, hurting her back and left knee with a few minor bruises.
Upon seeing her predicament, other pedestrians were quick to remove her from the manhole and accompany her to Type 5, which is down the road from where the incident occurred. The men on the scene also botched the covering in hopes that no one else will fall in.
“I’m not the first to fall into that specific manhole,” lamented Beverley. She says that a few of the men on the scene told her that persons have fallen into that manhole more than a few times since recently, adding that, “They keep patching it up but it loosens easily and people keep falling in.”
While there haven’t been any more reports, this manhole and many others like it are a menace and can be found throughout the city.
But Beverley wants more to be done.
“What if it was someone else with a baby? The baby would be seriously hurt or die! Suppose it was a school student walking alone?” she questioned.
A public plea is being issued to the relevant authorities to fix the manhole before more persons are injured or worse. “I don’t want anything, I just want them to fix it,” she said.
