Piparo is a village in Central
Trinidad on the southern edge of the
Central Range. The village has three main claims to fame:
Piparo was the base of operations of
Dole Chadee (born Nankissoon Boodram), a notorious
drug lord who was
executed in 1999 for the
murder of four members of the Baboolal family.
Piparo was the home of
Ras Shorty I (born Garfield Blackman) during his self-imposed break from the
soca world. Living simply in this rural community Ras Shorty-I developed jamoo, a fusion of
soca and
gospel music.
Piparo was the site of a large
mud volcano eruption on February 22, 1997. The eruption covered an area of 2.5 km² and displaced 31 families. The mud volcano now lies active where the eruption took place ( as of October 2019).[1]
During the early twentieth century, Piparo was an important
cocoa bean producer.
The small village is mainly inhabited by people of
African and
Indian descent. There is a
mandir, two mosques, and three churches.
Since the eruption in 1997, an alternate road to the village has been established through the village of Guaracara or a detour around the volcanic site through Panchoo trace.