By DENISE MAYCOCK

Tribune Freeport Reporter

dmaycock@tribunemedia.net

FREEPORT – The man who was discovered dead in his home at Queens Cove following the passing of Hurricane Sandy is believed to be Norbert Yonkers, a German, and longtime resident of the Bahamas.

Yonkers is believed to have lived in the Bahamas since 1965, according to a man who worked for him and considered him his mentor.

While touring the Queen’s Cove community on Sunday, Prime Minister Perry Christie and Minister for Grand Bahama Dr Michael Darville stopped and talked with residents.

Dr Darville said the area was five to six feet underwater.

He noted that before the storm Urban Renewal workers and police officers had visited the elderly man and other residents in the area informing them of the need to evacuate.

“Unfortunately, the elderly gentleman chose not to. And when the tide began to rise, when the water was about three feet we came back in here making requests for him to leave.

“He did not leave, but this gentleman (Yonkers’ employee) did come out with us. Unfortunately, when he returned he found that the gentleman had died.”

The man who found Yonkers dead said he had been working for him for two months.

He said after the storm he went to check on Yonkers on Saturday. He said the water was about three feet, just above his knee.

“I called to his front window, but heard no answer, so I went to the back and noticed that the storm surge had pushed in the back window.

“I went through the window and called his name, but there was no answer. I went to his room and found him dead face down,” the man said.

“Some of the (bedroom) furniture had fallen on him, only his torso was visible when I found him.”

The man said he checked to see whether Yonkers was breathing and called 911.

According to the man, water had got into the house and the furniture had been tossed around inside.

“I feel real bad because he was like a mentor to me. I had been working for him for two month, the man said. He is a real nice guy and no one deserves to go like that. He is from Germany and told me he came to the Bahamas since 1965, before I was born,” the man said.

Prime Minister Perry Christie said that Queens Cove is one of those areas that is of particular concern to the government.

“It was anticipated when we passed the Disaster Preparedness Act to require the government to establish a structure, to have leadership in that structure and to be able to require agencies of the government to take certain steps towards protecting the people of this country.

“The difficulty is that when that law was passed Queen’s Cove existed. It is one of the vulnerable areas that have been identified in this country… that has been impacted four times by a hurricane.

“One resident said he cannot move, and the government cannot come in and move them.

“Whatever legislation we passed, we simply do not have resources to do that.

“What we can do: Firstly, we have to decide on if you can build here. And if you can, then there have to be stipulations of what you can put here and how it should be built.

“In other words it might have to be 10ft high and on stilts, but the fact of the matter is that this is an area that has come to the attention of the government,” Mr Christie said.