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 News Around the Republic of Mexico | October 2005 
Death Toll from Hurricane Stan Rises in Central America
 Diego Mendez - Associated Press
| | A soldier carries a child to a boat during flooding in Veracruz, a busy port 185 miles east of Mexico City, Mexico, Wednesday, Oct. 5. Officials opened 950 shelters and were watching 80 communities considered to be vulnerable. (Photo: AP) |
San Salvador, El Salvador – Authorities searched flooded and mud-caked communities Wednesday for victims of storms spawned by Hurricane Stan that left a trail of destruction and killed 82 people across Central America.
The former Category 1 hurricane had weakened to a depression over the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca on Wednesday.
But while the worst seemed to be over in some areas, authorities were still searching for victims from the high winds and rain that washed out bridges, tore down roofs and inundated highways.
Officials in El Salvador's capital said 49 people had been killed, mostly due to mudslides unleashed by two days of rain. More than 16,700 Salvadorans had fled their homes for 167 shelters nationwide.
"This is a national tragedy because of the rains," said Eduardo Rivera, a spokesman for a team of Salvadoran rescue officials. "There isn't a corner of the country where there isn't pain and destruction to be found."
Among those evacuated were residents of Santa Tecla, outside the capital, San Salvador, where a strong earthquake caused a massive landslide in January 2001. Officials have worried the mountain running alongside the neighborhood might collapse again with heavy rains or another quake.
A 4.8-magnitude earthquake did shake the Pacific Ocean off the Salvadoran coast Tuesday, but no major damage or injuries were reported.
Honduras and Mexico said they would send aid.
Heavy rains also brought flooding that damaged bridges and submerged highways elsewhere in Central America.
In Guatemala, 19 people were killed – mostly in landslides, according to national disaster agency officials. Flooding in more than 88 communities forced the evacuation of more than 6,000 residents as nearly all of the country's rivers overflowed their banks, and landslides and fallen trees blocked at least 30 roadways.
Nine people died in Nicaragua, including six migrants believed to be Ecuadoreans killed in a boat wreck. Four deaths were reported in Honduras and one in Costa Rica.
Hurricane Stan came ashore Tuesday morning with 80 mph winds along a sparsely populated stretch of coastline south of Veracruz, a busy port 185 miles east of Mexico City.
Its outer bands swiped the city, flooding low-lying neighborhoods and highways. Officials in Veracruz state, which includes the city of the same name, said seven people, including two children, were injured, most by falling trees or roofs that collapsed in the coastal towns of Alvarado and Montepio.
In Mexico's Chiapas, wind and rain more directly associated with Stan caused a river to overflow its banks and roar through the city of Tapachula, carrying homes of wood and metal with it and forcing hundreds to flee. Army and navy personnel joined state and local officials in helping residents flee to higher ground, and President Vicente Fox planned to visit the area.
The city's center was littered with fallen branches and debris kicked up by flood waters and was virtually deserted Tuesday night, as those not forced to evacuate holed up inside their homes.
Near Mexico's border with Guatemala, Tapachula was largely cut off from surrounding areas as major highways, roads and bridges were left under water. Chiapas Gov. Pablo Salazar said four people were missing.
"Sadly, we know it's going to keep raining," Salazar said.
Schools around Mexico's Veracruz state canceled classes and 38,000 people abandoned their homes, heading for shelters. Heavy rains also forced Veracruz's Mexican League soccer squad, the "Tiburones Rojos," or "Red Sharks," to scrap a scheduled practice.
The state-owned oil monopoly Petroleos Mexicanos, or Pemex, said Stan disrupted an unspecified amount of output Tuesday as it swept through the Gulf of Mexico, but that it hopes to have those operations running again Wednesday.
The company's three Gulf coast crude-oil loading ports – Coatzacoalcos, Dos Bocas and Cayo Arcas – were shut down, but this wasn't expected to affect oil prices. The ports handle most of the 1.8 million barrels a day of crude oil exported by Pemex. Five exploratory oil platforms were evacuated Monday.
Pemex is the world's third-largest oil producer, and most of its exports are sent to the United States.
The National Hurricane Center in Miami reported that even a greatly weakened Stan would continue to dump heavy rain on Oaxaca and much of the rest of southern Mexico.
Associated Press Writers Manuel de la Cruz in Tapachula, Mexico; Miguel Hernandez in Veracruz, Mexico; Filadelfo Aleman in Managua, Nicaragua; Marianela Jimenez in San Jose, Costa Rica; Juan Carlos Llorca in Guatemala City; and Freddy Cuevas in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, contributed to this report. |
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