Miami, Jun. 6, (tca/dpa) – A weekend of torrential rains and widespread flooding in Haiti have left at least 42 people dead, 11 missing and some 19,000 homeless, the government’s disaster response agency said.
The Office of Civil Protection said the weather has left at least 7,475 families affected, and flooded at least 13,633 homes across several regional departments. The city of Léogâne, just south of Port-au-Prince, was most affected. The city also registered at least 11 deaths, Jerry Chandler, the head of the Office of Civil Protection, said Monday when the death toll still stood at about 30 and he cautioned the casualties were still preliminary.
By Monday afternoon, the numbers were updated to show that the damage is even more extensive than initially thought. At least 85 people have also been injured, authorities said, across seven of the country’s 10 regional departments.
“The biggest impact was in the West” region, Chandler said, referring to the area that encompasses the capital.
Stéphane Dujarric, spokesperson for UN Secretary-General António Guterres, told reporters during the world body’s daily noon briefing in New York that “the situation is extremely worrying, given the hurricane season is only just beginning.”
“Even before the landslides and flooding, half the population of Haiti was in need of humanitarian assistance,” he said. “We urge donors to scale up the support for the country’s Humanitarian Response Plan, which is sadly only 20 percent funded, and it is an appeal for $720 million.”
In addition to residents being washed out of their homes, major health centers including GHESKIO in Port-au-Prince suffered damage because of the rainfall. In the case of the clinic it was flooded not only because of the rains but because the Bois de chêne canal, located next door, hasn’t been cleaned out the last five years. The center’s director, Dr. Jean William “Bill” Pape said many computers, although placed on elevated platforms, have been damaged by the rains.
Other regions in the environmentally vulnerable country that saw heavy damage were: the Northwest; the Nippes; and the Southeast where a boat capsized Saturday morning that resulted in the death of two passengers. Fourteen others were rescued.
“In the Center department, the agricultural sector is very impacted,” the agency said in a statement.
Also affected is a bridge that was submerged from overflowing river waters, and several roads have also been cut off by flooding and boulders. While the damage assessment is ongoing, Chandler said emergency response teams are mobilized and trying to support affected communities. Along with United Nations aid groups, Civil Protection volunteers are slowly deploying shelter, food, hygiene kits and drinking water to the more than 37,000 people affected. The heavy rains, which began on Friday, occurred just days into the start of this year’s Atlantic hurricane season.
Chandler told the Miami Herald last week that while they had managed to increase training and improve communication coverage so they can get real-time information from their volunteers as disaster strikes, they have been unable to get supplies due to the ongoing gang violence.
On Monday, he said security remains a concern as they “timidly” try to respond to the disaster while also trying to maneuver through precarious gang-controlled territories to get help to the population.
The World Food Program said while the full consequences of the excess rainfall is still not known, the U.N. agency will start providing hot meals to displaced people over the coming hours. WFP is also mobilizing ready-to-eat rations and dry food that can assist up to 15,000 people.
Jean-Martin Bauer, WFP’s country director and Haiti’s acting humanitarian coordinator, said although this isn’t a cyclone or tropical storm that battered Haiti, “considerable damage” has been observed in the affected areas.
“WFP has the capacity to respond to this emergency, but a significant weather induced event of this level so early in the hurricane season, which generally runs from June to November each year, raises concerns about the ability to provide a sustained response should extreme weather incidents continue to occur,” the agency said in a statement.
The United Nations said climate change is already a daily reality for Haitians, and along with the environment can no longer be considered marginal issues.
“Hurricanes, floods, droughts: the increasing number of extreme events, combined with environmental degradation and deep social divisions, threaten the economy, infrastructure and the livelihoods of communities,” the U.N. said. “The recurrence and persistence of these problems constitute a threat and an aggravating factor in the instability of the country, which is already facing unprecedented levels of violence and uncertainty.”
GNA