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Tens Of Thousands Hit
By Floods In Caribbean

By Peter Prengaman, David Randall and Annabel Fallon

30 May 2004
The Independent


A disaster of grotesque proportions is unfolding in the Caribbean where floods on the island of Hispaniola have delivered death and destruction to one of the world's poorest regions on a scale far greater than first thought.

Yesterday, as the death toll climbed inexorably towards 2,500, a senior United Nations official in Haiti said that some 75,000 people face a "continuing emergency". Another feared the numbers affected could reach 100,000.

Even as he spoke, further rains were falling, adding to the deluge of 1.5 metres in 36 hours which triggered the sudden flashfloods and mudslides that drowned more than 2,000 Haitians and Dominicans who share this island, many as they slept.

Survivors said yesterday that children and the elderly stood little chance as the waters - "like a flood in the Bible", according to farmer Fernando Gueren - cascaded down mountains denuded of trees by decades of logging on to homes below. "Imagine a tidal wave 12ft high crashing down a mountain," said Adam Blackwell, the Canadian ambassador. "Entire families have been wiped out."

The true scale of the devastation is only now becoming apparent: at least 1,800 dead in Haiti, more than 400 killed in the Dominican Republic, 1,000 dead in the Haitian town of Mapou alone (where some 800 homes were destroyed), many areas where all crops and livestock have been wrecked or killed, and everywhere bodies - in the muddy waters that still cover whole villages, in the dams of debris that block watercourses, and even stuck in trees by receding floods.

Guy Gavreau, director of the UN World Food Programme in Haiti, said: "The magnitude of the disaster is much worse than we expected, with many, many more people affected."

Emergency crews warned of a possible epidemic if they do not quickly recover most bodies in Mapou and the south-central part of the island. They feared contamination of the underground water supply, which people here access through wells. Dominican officials said they plan to use planes to spray disinfectant over the border town of Jimani to keep decomposing bodies from spreading disease.

The relief effort - which now involves the US-led peace-keeping troops and aid organisations from Europe and the US and Canada - is severely hampered by the destruction of many roads. In many places helicopters are the only way in, and there are only 14 operational craft in the entire country. Mr Gavreau said the World Food Programme distributed food to about 1,000 families in Mapou on Friday. "But we need four or five times that amount here" - much more than can be carried in by helicopter. He said they also would have to help survivors for far longer than expected because corn and other vegetable crops were destroyed, and the football-pitch-sized lake created by the floods also carried corpses of pigs and goats.

Mapou is just 30 miles south-east of the capital, Port-au-Prince, but is now totally cut off except by helicopter. Water 10ft deep still covers a town where the wells are now polluted by corpses. Hundreds gathered there as World Food Programme workers handed out bags of rice and beans and bottles of water. This was meant to provide their first meal since Monday, though each family got only four pints of water altogether, not only to quench their thirst but to cook their food as well.

Many of those queuing had horrific tales to tell. Jean-Claude Germain, a 25-year-old farmer, said: "I had to watch everything I love and own washed away by the waters, but I never even saw my children being taken."

He said he lost two sons and two daughters along with his sister-in-law and her two children. Ivse Toussaint, 35, lost his wife and six children, the youngest of whom was two. "I tried to get my kids up on the roof but the water was moving too fast," he said. "When it reached my head, I couldn't see the children and pulled myself through a window and up to the roof."

Fedner Salomond, a 39-year-old father of three, said he faced a terrible choice when flood waters rushed into his home in the dark. He had one of his children in his arms but was unable to reach the other two before making a desperate climb to the roof. "The one in my hands, I had to let go. I could not climb with him, because I was going to die ... My heart was breaking, but I had to make a choice whether both of us died or I was saved."

In Jimani, on the Haitian-Dominican border, where the Solie River burst its banks and obliterated entire neighbourhoods, the streets last week were lined with the coffins of children. Juary Cuevas, 18, was swept six miles down river by the floodtide and into a crocodile-infested lake choked with bodies. His grandmother was killed, and his father, two siblings and grandfather are missing.

Kevin Cook, communications director for the London-based aid agency World Vision, said: "The whole town has been completely devastated by the floods. In the unbuilt-up areas it looks like a moon state - nothing but dried mud and the boulders which fell off the mountains. Most of the houses have gone ... I have seen people wandering around just literally caked in mud."

Just how many of these people have perished is still impossible to know. Many areas remain inaccessible, and aid workers barely dare to contemplate what awaits them when the waters finally recede.

For the moment, there is little chance of that. Five days after this nightmare began, rain was falling again. Weather forecasters said another 3in of rain was expected over the weekend, and urged people to head for the highest ground they could find.

This is a disaster that could yet become even more heartrending.