Adrian Frater, News Editor

Western Bureau:

While the uprooted trees to the side showed signs of the impact of the hurricane, except for a few broken decorative lights, the US$30 Trelawny Multi-Purpose Stadium in Falmouth was left unscathed by Hurricane Dean.

When The Gleaner visited the 25,000-seat facility yesterday morning, the scenic stadium, which hosted the opening ceremony for the 2007 ICC Cricket World Cup, showed no signs of the heavy battering which was seen just half a mile away at the informal housing settlement at Zion.

"It stood up quite well," said a security supervisor atthe stadium. "During the heavy winds last night some of the decorative bulbs were broken, but nothing else happened."

According to the supervisor, immediately after the bulbs were broken, she made a report to Jamaica Cricket 2007, which has overall responsibility for stadium. Following her report, a full inspection of the facility was done.

"A team from Jamaica Cricket 2007 came here this morning and they did a complete inspection of all the facilities in my presence," said the supervisor. "The broken bulbs were the only signs of any damage in the entire stadium. Everything else was okay."

The fact that the stadium did not suffer any adverse effects as a consequence of the hurricane was clear vindication for the Chinese developers COMPLANT, which stated during the construction of the facility last year that it would be able to handle the ravages of a major hurricane.

"It is being constructed to withstand a hurricane and other similar natural disasters," COMPLANT executive, Kevin Chen, told The Gleaner, last October. "This stadium is being designed to serve for many generations to come."

Source of controversy

The stadium, which had remained out of use for the three months following the April 11 World Cup opening ceremony, became a source of much controversy in early July when James Robertson, the Jamaica Labour Party's (JLP) shadow minister for Youth, Community Development and Sport, said he had received reports that the stadium fell into disrepair.

Since then, the Trelawny Cricket Association (TCA), which was lobbying for the use of the stadium, was finally granted permission to host limited-overs games in the all-island one-day cricket championship there.

"We are extremely pleased that the hurricane did not damage the stadium as it really means a lot to the people of Trelawny," a well-placed source in the TCA told The Gleaner, yesterday. "We do not want it to become a further political football for those persons who did not want us to get it."