Min­is­ter of Rur­al De­vel­op­ment and Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Khadi­jah Ameen has as­sured res­i­dents that au­thor­i­ties are close­ly mon­i­tor­ing the height­ened ac­tiv­i­ty at the Pi­paro Mud Vol­cano and tak­ing mea­sures to safe­guard pub­lic safe­ty.

Speak­ing on the sit­u­a­tion, Min­is­ter Ameen said, “The safe­ty and well be­ing of res­i­dents re­main our high­est pri­or­i­ty. Our dis­as­ter man­age­ment teams and emer­gency ser­vices are on the ground con­duct­ing thor­ough as­sess­ments, and we are main­tain­ing close co­or­di­na­tion with all rel­e­vant agen­cies to en­sure that ap­pro­pri­ate mea­sures are im­ple­ment­ed swift­ly should con­di­tions change.”

She con­firmed that ini­tial dam­age as­sess­ments are be­ing con­duct­ed in col­lab­o­ra­tion with Dis­as­ter Man­age­ment Units from the Cou­va Tabaquite Tal­paro Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion and the Princes Town Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion, along­side the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice, the Trinidad and To­ba­go Mu­nic­i­pal Po­lice Ser­vice, the Min­istry of Works and In­fra­struc­ture, the Trinidad and To­ba­go Elec­tric­i­ty Com­mis­sion and the Trinidad and To­ba­go Fire Ser­vice.