Agatha’s Aftermath

Agatha's Aftermath

As the new figures and images keep pouring in it becomes obvious that the tropical storm Agatha has caused more damages in Guatemala than Hurricane Stan in 2005 or Hurricane Mitch in 1998.

By the end of Sunday, May 30, these were the figures 82 dead, 111,964 evacuees, 29,245 in shelters, 13 bridges collapsed, [many] roads blocked by landslides or floods (via webO_o). Climaya calls Guatemala the country most affected but also Honduras and El Salvador were affected by the storm Agatha in Muerte y destrucción causa Agatha en Centroamérica. HablaGuate reported about 15 houses that were destroyed in San Pedro Las Huertas (the village I live in) and all the houses lost in Ciudad Vieja, Sacatepéquez. The list of damages caused by tropical storm Agatha just in Guatemala is an endless river of updates in Twitter and Facebook.

Below I share with you just a few samples so you can get an idea of the current state of Guatemala; not a terra firma country any more but an archipelago of isolated communities. 🙁

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Stop Agatha, Stop!

Stop Agatha, Stop!

Guatemalans urgently need a break!

First we experience a short but strong jolt cause by an earthquake. Right after Pacaya volcano began erupting and spewing black volcanic sand and ash over Guatemala City, which cause the closing of the main international airport of Guatemala. People were still cleaning up the black sand and ash when we got hit by tropical storm Agatha, which behaves pretty much like a hurricane.

We urgently need a break!

Of course the tropical storm Agatha is the worst of all evils because it hit hard the entire country with a heavy downpour which caused floods and land slides in many places, including La Antigua Guatemala. Many people have lost their houses and many more have been evacuated and are now living in temporary shelters. A flood of tweets and Facebooks updates keep inundating the timelines with the hash tags #Pacaya, #AgathaGT, #CenizasGT, #ApagonGT, etc. You can look at all the photos from tropical storm Agatha that people are uploading at http://is.gd/cvbam and http://is.gd/cvbak.

Don’t you agree that we need a break from Nature’s catastrophes? 🙁

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