U.N. Aid in Haiti Held Up by Lack of Help From Government
By JAMES C. McKINLEY Jr.
New York Times
GONAÏVES, Haiti, Sept. 24 — The United Nations began distributing about 40 tons of food from two different places in the city this morning, but they were hampered by a lack of help from the Haitian government and the local authorities.
United Nations officials have had to rely on peacekeeping forces from Argentina and police officers from Africa and Canada to keep order in this city of 200,000, where more than 1,000 people have died in the aftermath of Tropical Storm Jeanne, which raked the coast last weekend.
"We are having trouble organizing and distributing food because there is no authority existing in the town," said Eric Mouillefarine, the head of the United Nations office of coordination for humanitarian affairs in Port-au-Prince, the capital.
It was a measure of the chaos that one shipment of food sent here by a church outside Port-au-Prince was partly looted before it even reached the town, witnesses said.
At 10:15 the church's truck arrived at the temporary United Nations headquarters and was immediately mobbed by a crowd of men. As the doors swung open, people scrambled for bananas, water, rice and other things that would-be samaritans were trying to bring to the town.
"This is not the place to do this," said Areito Ferreira, the commander of the United Nations police force, as he watched in dismay as the crowd rushed the truck. "There is no coordination around here."
There were a few signs of people trying to return to a normal life here. Women were selling fruit and other food in the street. Some shops that were not destroyed in the storm began to do business, especially mechanics, gas stations and bicycle stores. But for the most part the city remained a chaotic and distraught place.
Many houses have been washed away. There are overturned cars and trucks that were tossed around like toys by the torrents of water. Many people are still living on the second floor of their houses and trying desperately to shovel out tons of mud on the ground floors.
Bodies are still being found in the wreckage and people on the street hold limes to their noses to kill the stench.
City officials said on Thursday that they had begun burying victims in common graves, but health workers said that they feared cholera and other waterborne diseases would soon infect the survivors, who wandered through the streets, between washed-away buildings, through calf-deep, foul-smelling water, with their belongings on their heads.
"There is no water, no electricity, no communication," Mayor Calixte Valentin said. "Many people don't have a place to sleep."
The tropical storm, slow-moving and with relatively low winds, thrashed the north of Haiti last Friday and Saturday, flooding the island's denuded hills with torrents of rain that washed away much of this town. Residents said the waters rose as high as 10 feet in the streets of the town, drowning hundreds of people. Tropical Storm Jeanne, now headed toward the Bahamas and possibly Florida, intensified into a hurricane after it left Haiti.
By midafternoon on Thursday, Haitian officials said the storm had killed more than 1,105 people in the country, the great majority of them in Gonaïves. Another 1,251 people are still missing, said Dieufort Deslorges, the spokesman for the Civil Protection Bureau. At least 4,000 houses were destroyed, he said, adding, "The biggest problem right now is the need for clean water."
In the town, carcasses of animals rotted in the receding waters and the smell of bodies and open sewers poisoned the air. Many buildings had been washed away. The rest were filled with heavy mud. Crops of corn outside town were swept away by the masses of water.
The catastrophe here comes in a year marked by revolts, military intervention and deadly floods. Gonaïves was also a center of fighting during the revolt in February that led to the ouster of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, in which 300 people were killed.
Maita Álvarez, an aid worker with Oxfam, which is distributing clean water, said: "The hygiene situation is appalling. There is no running water, no latrine. Some people have been drinking dirty water where dead bodies were floating. It's appalling."
The efforts by the United Nations, Oxfam, CARE and other aid groups to get food and water to the town have been hampered by the poor condition of the main road from Port-au-Prince, a trip that takes at least five hours. Just outside Gonaïves, the road is submerged for about a mile under three feet of flood waters. Several trucks have slipped off the road into the water, including at least one World Food Program vehicle.
That only amounts to about 2 tracktor-trailer loads.
Hardly a drop in a bucket as to what's needed,I bet.
Hurricane Jeanne Advisory Number 46
Statement as of 11:00 PM EDT on September 24, 2004
...Core of Hurricane Jeanne expected to move over the northwestern
Bahamas on Saturday...
a Hurricane Warning is in effect along the Florida East Coast from
Florida City northward to St. Augustine...including Lake
Okeechobee.
A Hurricane Warning remains in effect for the northwestern Bahamas
...Including the Abacos...Andros Island...Berry Islands...Bimini...
Eleuthera...Grand Bahama Island...and New Providence. A Hurricane
Warning means that hurricane conditions are expected in the warning
area within the next 24 hours.
A Hurricane Watch remains in effect for the northeast Florida and
Georgia coasts from north of St. Augustine northward to Altamaha
Sound Georgia. A Hurricane Watch means that hurricane conditions
are possible in the watch area in the next 36 hours.
A Tropical Storm Warning remains in effect for the central Bahamas
...Including Cat Island...the Exumas...Long Island...Rum Cay...and
San Salvador. A Tropical Storm Warning means that tropical storm
conditions are expected in the warning area in the next 24 hours.
At 11 PM EDT...0300z...the tropical storm watch has been extended
northward along the West Coast of Florida to the Suwanee River.
A tropical storm watch is now in effect from south of Florida City
around the southern end of the Florida Peninsula and northward
along the West Coast to the Suwanee River...including Florida
Bay...and the Florida Keys north of the Seven Mile Bridge.
We are reminded that Yom Kippur...a solemn Jewish Holiday...will
last until Sundown Saturday. Some of your Jewish neighbors in the
watch and warning areas observing Yom Kippur will not be
listening to radios or watching TV...and may not be aware of the
hurricane situation.
Satellite images indicate that at 11 PM EDT...0300z...the large eye
of Hurricane Jeanne was located near latitude 26.5 north...
longitude 74.9 west or about 135 miles..220 km...east of Great
Abaco Island. This also about 315 miles...510 km...east of the
Southeast Florida coast.
Jeanne is moving toward the west near 12 mph...19 km/hr...and this
general motion is expected to continue during the next 12 to 24
hours. On this track...the core of Jeanne will be moving across the
northwestern Bahamas on Saturday.
Maximum sustained winds are near 100 mph...160 km/hr...with higher
gusts. Some strengthening is forecast during the next 24 hours and
Jeanne has the chance to become a major hurricane before landfall
in Florida.
Hurricane force winds extend outward up to 70 miles...110 km...
from the center...and tropical storm force winds extend outward up
to 205 miles...335 km...mainly to the northeast of the center.
Estimated minimum central pressure is 964 mb...28.47 inches.
Storm surge flooding of 4 to 8 feet above normal tide levels...along
with large and dangerous battering waves...can be expected near the
center of Jeanne on the north side of Grand Bahama Island and on
the west side of the abaco islands. Storm surge flooding of 2 to 4
feet above normal tide levels can be expected on the west side of
the other islands of the Bahamas in the Hurricane Warning area.
Coastal storm surge flooding of 4 to 6 feet above normal tide
levels...along with large and dangerous battering waves...can be
expected near and to the north of where the center makes landfall
along the Florida East Coast.
Rainfall totals of 5 to 10 inches are possible along the track of
Jeanne over the northwestern Bahamas and Florida.
Tides will gradually be rising in the warned area during the next 24
hours. Additionally...dangerous surf and rip currents...caused by
large swells generated by Hurricane Jeanne...are possible elsewhere
along the southeastern U.S. Coast and the northwest and central
Bahamas for the next few days.
Repeating the 11 PM EDT position...26.5 N... 74.9 W. Movement
toward...west near 12 mph. Maximum sustained winds...100 mph.
Minimum central pressure... 964 mb.
For storm information specific to your area...please monitor
products issued by your local weather office.
An intermediate advisory will be issued by the National Hurricane
Center at 2 am EDT followed by the next complete advisory at 5 am
EDT.
Forecaster Avila
At the base of the abominable government problems in Haiti lies their peculiar attachment to Voodoo, still a very powerful force there. Some Haitians actually curl up and die when they believe they've been cursed. Papa Doc made use of Voodoo to keep the people in line, now they do it to themselves. Some bring voodoo with them to FLorida. I've heard drums in the night in a neighborhood near the Haitian quarter of Deerfield Beach.
Which has nothing to do with the facts of hurricane damage but possibly much to do with the Haitians' reaction to it. Such a pity, as they seem quite charming and warm-hearted, and some are quite hard working.