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SVREL prepares Caymanas Park for Hurricane Melissa
October 27, 2025
CAYMANAS Park's boss, Solomon Sharpe, chairman Supreme Ventures Racing and Entertainment Limited (SVREL), said the promoting company has done all it can to prepare the vulnerable 196-acre property for the passage of Hurricane Melissa.
Forecast to be possibly the most destructive hurricane in Jamaica's history, Melissa is projected to make landfall as a Category Four hurricane at approximately 8 a.m. tomorrow morning, dissecting Jamaica on a path through St Catherine.
Whether Caymanas Park - located in Portmore, St Catherine - gets the full force of Melissa, flooding will be inevitable at the racetrack surrounded by the communities of Meadowvale, Caymanas Gardens, Independence City, Gregory Park and Waterford.
At least one neighbouring community has a storm water run-off into Caymanas Park.
"Preparations to batten down for the hurricane have been ongoing. We have been working around the clock, cleaning drains and all we have to do," Sharpe assured on Saturday after the day's 10-race meet concluded.
Sharpe said though SVREL was criticised for staging a racemeet while the rest of the country was busy pulling down shutters from early Friday, the racetrack's management had one eye on the weather forecast and the other on horsemen's welfare.
"We have a unique agricultural business. We have to give horsemen every possible, but safe chance to earn purse money. Not only horsemen need to earn. Caymanas Park is also a unique eco-system in the Portmore community on which many sub-industries rely on a racemeet for day-to-day viability," Sharpe explained.
"We kept watching the forecast, which said the weather would have been friendly. We stuck to the forecast and got a good day. It's now left to be seen what happens in the next few days," the SVREL chairman added, pointing out that preparation for the passage of Hurricane Melissa was long activated.
Meanwhile, United States-bred MAIN MISTRESS, partnered by six-time champion jockey Omar Walker took division one of the Announcers' Trophy by the scruff of the neck as a 4-5 favourite, quickly taking control of the six-and-a-half furlong event from rail-running COOKIE DAY N NIGHT, who stubbornly held second to the wire from the looking pair of HUNTSMAN and OIL MACHINE.
MR SENATOR won division two with a smooth rail run from the three pole under claiming rider Eric Haughton, grabbing the lead from United States-bred FINAL LOAD, who led under pressure from 2-5 favourite ZULU WARRIOR, both skating wide off the home turn.
