Wednesday, November 21, 2012

Victims of Hurricane Sandy forgotten in Haiti

Terra Daily via AFP: Hurricane Sandy, the deadly storm that slammed into New York and New Jersey in October, tore through the Caribbean long before reaching America. In Haiti, many still await help.

Flooding from Sandy killed 54 people and left thousands homeless in Haiti, another woe for a country still struggling to recover from a 2010 earthquake that killed more than 200,000 people, and a cholera epidemic that broke out months later and has killed more than 7,000 people.

Nearly one month after the government of President Michel Martelly declared a national emergency, scores of residents in the hard-hit town of Petit-Goave, in south-western Haiti, still live in emergency shelters.

In the Nan banann (Among the Bananas) neighborhood located between the Caiman river and the sea, residents mourn their dead outside homes still buried under layers of mud and banana trees swept in by flood waters.

"It's the Caiman river that is the cause of our misfortunes," said Elnee Prophete, one of the storm victims. "When it overflows, it sweeps away everything in its path," Prophete said, pointing to what remains of her house, buried to the roof in a reddish mud...

Hurricane Sandy on October 22, 2012, from NASA

No comments: