Flower shortage set to break hearts?

Bermuda is facing a Valentine’s Day flower shortage as major snow blizzards look set to hammer the east coast of the US.

Thousands of roses, tulips and orchids could be stranded in cities like Boston and Newark if the two-feet of snow predicted over the weekend cripples air routes to the island.

The storm has prompted United Airlines to cancel its service from Newark today and tomorrow, and other airlines are expected follow suit.

Local florists are keeping their fingers crossed that the severe weather front passes quickly and their shipments arrive in time for February 14.

One source told the Bermuda Sun: “These orders would have put in several weeks ago in the build up to Valentine’s Day.

“The flowers are currently being picked in places like Holland, Thailand and Ecuador and they should arrive in Boston this weekend. “If they can not get the flowers in to Boston or even out of the city because of the snow then we are going to have problems.

“One of the options is trucking the flowers south to an airport that is operational, but we will  have to see if that is possible.

“We have more than 3,500 roses, and thousands of orchids and tulips on order, and we fear that they may not arrive in time.”

Rachel Smith, head florist at DEMCO, added: “People sometimes go into panic mode when something like this happens.

“But I have every faith that we will have our flowers in on time.

“Some of our flowers do come in from Boston, but we also get a large proportion through Delaware.

“Hopefully the storm will have moved on by next Monday when we are due to get most of our flowers in.”

While Nikki Begg, who runs Petals, told the Bermuda Sun: “Everyone is in the same boat as we don’t want to bring the flowers in too early.

“We are receiving our shipment on Tuesday so we just have to stay posted with what is going on with the weather and make a decision closer to the time.”

Forecasters have predicted that the storm will hit Massachusetts with up to two feet of snow, high winds and coastal flooding.

The blizzards are expected to intensify this afternoon and as much as one to two inches are expected to fall per hour after 6pm.

Lisa Holroyd, manager of Designer Flowers, said: “Our operation is based out of New York so we are just hoping that these snow storms do not affect New York too.

“We should have all our fresh flowers in Bermuda, all being well, by Tuesday in time for Valentines.”