That Time the Banana Rat Caused an Evacuation; or, I Always Miss the Fun

Sometimes I like to look to see who is actually reading my crazy, random observations and stories and I can see some interesting statistics, like how many people have accessed the blog (almost 13K---wow), the countries that access it most often (U.S., Germany, France, Russia), and---most curiously----the number of people who find it through search terms.

Who would have thought that the phrases "banana rats," "GTMO banana rat," or "hutia" would bring so many people here?

So with that, I have a recent story about a little drama caused by one of the cute, albeit destructive, little rodents.

Traveling between 2 campuses every other day means that I get to see and do a lot of fun things on each campus.

If I'm lucky, I'm at the elementary campus for field day. I'm at the secondary campus for fun events, like The Amazing Base.

Here's a depressing secret to you secondary folks: the elementary campus gets snacks and baked goods all the time from parents. I guess parents of teens are just too worn out to bake.

And to you elementary folks: the beauty of the secondary campus is you will DEFINITELY get a 40 minute lunch every single day. After 20 years of mostly eating lunch in 10-15 minutes while standing, I do enjoy a dedicated, campus-wide lunch period with no students on campus. (We have no secondary cafeteria, so they are bused to restaurants on base or can take their cars off campus).

Sometimes I'm lucky and get to experience and see the fun parts of each campus' week.

And then there are days that, well, I miss out on all the excitement.

Last Friday was VERY eventful at the elementary---or so I hear---as usual, I missed out on the fun. And who was responsible for the action-packed madness? It was one of these guys:

The Hutia

Yes, it's the hutia, also known as the banana rat.

They are nocturnal and vegetarian. They are mostly vegetarian. I say "mostly" because they have the amazing ability to eat everything under your car's hood in just one night.

My neighbors found hutias in their engine block. They had done the chicken wire treatment you are always warned to do when you move here, and yet, the little guys had eaten through the wire and were working on the engine.

At some point on Friday, a truck owned by the school went from one campus to the other. I'm not sure on the timeline of the actual events, but I know that at some point. hutias ate the fuel line of the truck. And shortly after school started on the elementary campus, staff starting smelling the unmistakable stench of gas. And it was strong.

So an evacuation and clean up and hour or so later, all was well with the world. I'm not sure if the hutia made it or not---maybe it looked down from the top of a tree close by, laughing at the debacle it caused. Maybe it was asleep, drunk on gas fumes. Or maybe it just lumbered away, being the big, dumb, and slow rodent that it is, and knew that its days were numbered anyway, so why not live a little and enjoy a tasty snack?

Either way, hutias make us realize who is REALLY in charge of this island.

More about the crazy wildlife that populates our base, which also acts as a nature preserve, from National Geographic:  National Geographic: Guantanamo's Wild Side: Huge Boas, "Banana Rats," More