Tag: Sandy

The other side of Sandy

Haiti was hit hardest

Jamaica, Cuba and the Bahamas took direct hits as Sandy approached them as a Category 1 and 2 storm.

Hurricane Sandy’s toll in the Caribbean amounts to at least 69 dead, thousands homeless and few funds available to rebuild. Yet, the Caribbean carnage remains largely behind the scenes as media spotlight focuses on the US.

Sandy took the lives of 52 people in Haiti, 11 in Cuba, two in the Bahamas, two in the Dominican Republic, one in Jamaica and one in Puerto Rico.

In light of the difficulty to rebuild in some of the impoverished areas of the Caribbean, especially Haiti, the United Nations will be appealing for emergency aid.

“Haiti is trying to get its house in order, but each time disaster strikes, the progress is interrupted,” head of the UN’s office for the co-ordination of humanitarian affairs Johan Peleman told The Guardian. “This country is exposed to devastating consequences by each storm. With every burst of rain, entire mountains are washed away.”

The majority of deaths and the most extensive damage fell upon Haiti, already devastated by the 2010 earthquake. The storm passed to the west of the country, but dumped more than 20 inches (51cm) of rain in 24 hours, causing rivers to overflow.

The damage is especially significant there because the country already had about 400,000 homeless since the deadly earthquake. Now 200,000 more had been added to the list because of Sandy.

During the storm nearly 17,800 people had to move to 131 temporary shelters.

Haitian Ministry of Agriculture official Jean Debalio Jean-Jacques announced that Hurricane Sandy destroyed 70 per cent of the crops in southern Haiti and caused widespread deaths of livestock.

“We are facing a major crisis,” stated Prime Minister Laurent Lamothe.

On top of all that, Haiti was also emerging from the aftermath of Tropical Strom Isaac, which hit the country in August, and a cholera epidemic that killed thousands and afflicted more than half a million people.

The Haitian government fears that the post-Sandy devastation may increase the number of cholera cases. Eighty-six new cases of cholera have already been reported in the last month and more are expected. The cholera outbreak began in October 2010 and many of the victims were from refugee camps established to host those who lost their houses in the quake.

Sandy reached Jamaica last Wednesday as a Category 1 storm, killing one person, leaving dozens of families homeless and causing at least $16.5 million in damage, according to the country’s Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller.

“Even before the hurricane we faced serious economic challenges. This has been made worse by the passage of Hurricane Sandy,” Simpson Miller said.

The storm then hit Cuba early Thursday as a Category 2 hurricane, killing 11 in Santiago and Guantanamo provinces, causing 5,000 buildings to at least partially collapse and 30,000 others to lose their roofs. In addition, Sandy damaged essential crops including banana, coffee, bean and sugar.

Public buildings such as schools and hospitals were also damaged.

Then as the storm turned to the Bahamas, it killed two people, toppled power poles and flooded streets.

In Puerto Rico the storm killed one person on Friday and forced 100 families to evacuate from their homes to seek shelter elsewhere.

In the Dominican Republic more than 18,100 people had to be evacuated as the storm destroyed bridges and isolated at least 130 communities. Flooding and heavy rains had damaged about 3,500 homes.

Difficulty repairing damage

Former secretary general of the Association of Caribbean States Norman Girvan strongly believes that other parties should pitch in to make the reconstruction possible.

“We should look at the Caribbean, because the hurricane has had an impact on Jamaica and Cuba and Haiti. One would like to see some form of Caricom [Caribbean Community] response to the severe infrastructural damage and human damage done in these countries, which unfortunately does not attract as much media attention as that in the US,” he told The Guardian.

It will be very difficult for Haiti to rebuild on its own.

“We’ll have famine in the coming days,” Kechner Toussaint, mayor of Abricots, a hard-hit community on Haiti’s Southwestern tip, told BET. “It’s an agricultural disaster.”

Also, John Chaloner at the charity Plan International told The Independent that in recent months there had been “demonstrations sparked by rising food prices”.

Faced with food shortages and a wider cholera outbreak, Haiti is at risk of not only failing to restore itself, but falling deeper into destruction and even civil unrest unless help arrives. – RT

Looters love Sandy

Water that had risen six feet high hadn’t completely drained away from the streets of Coney Island in Brooklyn, N.Y., yet looters had already rifled through the remains of vulnerable shops on Mermaid Avenue.

At about 8 a.m. on Tuesday, workers arrived at Mega Aid Pharmacy to find that not only had Hurricane Sandy obliterated the building’s interior the night before, but thieves had broken in and gone through more than 10,000 pharmaceutical items. Most of the stolen goods were prescription meds.

“The water went away and these people started walking down the streets and just robbed stores,” a frustrated worker at the pharmacy, who wished to remain anonymous, told HuffPost Crime.

He and the pharmacy’s manager, 27-year-old Stan Gutkin, looked at their shop in disbelief that afternoon as workers carried out salvageable supplies.

“I don’t even know what it’s going to take until we’re operational,” Gutkin said. “This breaks the business. I don’t even know where to start.”

Their story was just one of many on Mermaid Avenue, one of only a few streets in Coney Island on Tuesday teeming with people — and officers. Locals said that the police presence in the neighborhood came after looters stole from banks, pharmacies and other shops with valuables.

It’s a crime that can almost be expected after a disaster. As Hurricane Irene pummeled the Atlantic Coast last year, looting was so prevalent that truTV put together a security footage slideshow of the crime. Shortly after Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans was plagued with looting and violent attacks, The New York Times reported.

Solid numbers aren’t yet available for New York City crimes connected to the superstorm. The 60th Precinct, which covers Coney Island, was evacuated and subsequently flooded on Monday night. Though several officers couldn’t say definitively whether there had been reports of looting or other crimes in the area, many were quick to tell onlookers to go home.

“It’s getting dark, and it’s real dangerous out here — that’s why there’s a cop on every block,” one NYPD officer told HuffPost Crime. “You could get your stuff stolen.”

Nearby, at a city housing project called Ocean Towers, a fight broke out in front of reporters and cops. Two women threw haymakers at one another as residents — all still without power — stared and yelled from their windows. Other people threw unidentified objects from their windows at officers, who swarmed in to break up the fistfight.

Dena Wells, 39, a resident of Ocean Towers, had had enough after watching the melee.

“People are turning on each other — they’re attacking each other,” she said, shaking her head. “Even when there’s no disaster, this building is disastrous. But after the hurricane, it just got crazy.

“We have to get out of here.” – Huffington Post