Email

Print

Jules Vasquez- Reporter
"How does it feel to know that the 5C's is now on par with NOA and NASA in terms of having this technology available at its disposal?"

Dr. Leonard Nurse- Chairman, 5C's
"Well, it is a singular honour for the 5C's, I believe, to be able to acquire this technology. There are many developed countries that do not own or have this technology themselves. So, to be able to pull this off, I think we owe a debt of gratitude to the executive director Dr. Kenrick Leslie because he is the one who almost single handedly, with his skills and know-how relating to Lidar technology, he is the one who piloted this process and saw it through from start to finish."

Dr. Kenrick Leslie- Director, Climate Change Center
"Today marks another major mile stone where for the first time technology that is only available in the more advanced countries like the United States but never in a developing country like Belize. We will have an airborne Lidar system. That is critical if we are to address the issues of resilience and sustainability, not just to climate change but in general. We need to understand the areas where and how we use our land, how we control our marine areas and so on."

Dr. Leonard Nurse - Chairman, 5C's
"In terms of planning, it is going to be used for the location of coastal settlements, where people live, to protect them from disasters like storm surge, to protect them from such threats. It is also going to be useful to identify those areas that are unstable and it can simultaneously collect data on a number of variables together."

Dr. Kenrick Leslie- Director, Climate Change Center
"So, since 2006 the center has been trying to find ways of how we can bring down this cost. Over the last 12 years, through different ways of trying things and so on, eventually, under a program with the United States Agency for International Development, we have been able to acquire a $2 million dollar state of the art system; system that is used by the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration in the United States and NASA. So, we are at the top of the line. But, more importantly, we have developed the technical skills, where we can bring down the costs of doing that type of survey by a factor of 10. Therefore, we will be able to do it for all CARICOM countries at a cost that we can afford."

Dr. Leonard Nurse- Chairman, 5C's
"This is absolutely critical and this is beyond the 5C's because this is of absolute importance for the entire region. It provides a tool where we can now provide greater precision in our data analysis, particularly for coastal Lithosphere and near-shore topography, as well as in land, so that, it provides a tool where we can get very high quality, very high resolution data, which we could not acquire before. As a matter of fact, on those occasions where we required lidar data we had to acquire it from a company or contractor outside of the region at exceedingly high costs."

Dr. Kenrick Leslie- Director, Climate Change Center
"Maya Island Air has partnered with the center by providing a brand new plane specially designed in the interior to accommodate our system. Without that we would not have been able to do that. And I want to take off my hat to the management of Maya Island Air for affording us that service. That is why we are here today at the airport."

Chris Sosa- CEO, Maya Island Air
"In order to support the type of missions that he is seeking to carry out in Belize and across the Caribbean, we would have to procure and aircraft from Tetra Aviation. That is our primary contribution, being in support of the project of the 5C's, flying the missions and providing the maintenance support and avionics and instrumentation support in order to carry out these missions regardless of prevailing weather conditions."

Jules Vasquez
"So, it is a specialized aircraft?"

Chris Sosa
"Yes, absolutely; this aircraft is highly equipped with instruments that will allow it to fly under instrument flight rules, prevailing poor weather, that sort of thing. So, this piece of equipment is the most sophisticated that can be mounted onto this type of aircraft. This is a great project; historic for Belize, historic for the Caribbean and we are introducing a type of technology that is normally reserved for first world countries. That it is accessible in this region means that universities, scientific research communities, and private sector investment now have an opportunity to benefit considerably from its ease of access."

The launch was held at the Municipal Airstrip and the project is sponsored by USAID's C-CAP Project.