Eta back to sea as nations tally losses
SAN PEDRO SULA, Honduras — As the remnants of Hurricane Eta moved back over Caribbean waters, governments in Central America worked to tally the displaced and dead and recover bodies from landslides and flooding that claimed dozens of lives from Guatemala to Panama.
It will be days before the true toll of Eta is known. Its torrential rains battered economies already strangled by the COVID19 pandemic, took all from those who had little and laid bare the shortcomings of governments unable to aid their citizens and pleading for international assistance.
In Guatemala, the first army brigade reached a huge landslide Friday morning in the central mountains where an estimated 150 homes were buried Thursday. They had not recovered any bodies yet, but said more than 100 people were believed to be missing. In a news conference, President Alejandro Giammattei said he believed there were at least 100 dead there in San Cristobal Verapaz.
“The panorama is complicated in that area,” he said, noting that rescuers were struggling to access the site.
A week of rain spoiled crops, washed away bridges and flooded homes across Central America. Hurricane Eta’s arrival Tuesday afternoon in northeastern Nicaragua followed days of drenching rain as it crawled toward shore. Its slow, meandering path north through Honduras pushed rivers over their banks and pouring into neighborhoods where families were forced onto rooftops to wait for rescue. Wendi Munguia Figueroa, 48, and nine relatives huddled Friday on the corrugated metal roof of her home surrounded by brown floodwaters.
“We can’t get off our houses’ roofs because the water is up to our necks in the street,” Munguia said. Her neighbors likewise occupied their roofs.
The forecast had Eta strengthening to a tropical storm before nearing the Cayman Islands on Saturday and crossing Cuba on Sunday. From there it could reach Florida or eventually head toward the U. S. Gulf coast.