Guatemala: Landslide zones become burial grounds
The first rescue teams reaching Guatemala’s isolated communities reported 133 more confirmed fatalities, raising the death toll in mudslides linked to Hurricane Stan to 652 with 384 missing.
The new reports of dead and missing – which could raise the death toll past 1,000 – emerged from the first army and civil defence teams to reach the western township of Tacana, near the Mexico border, an area largely cut off from the rest of the country by mudslides that remained dangerously unstable.
Meanwhile, some Indian villages were converted into de-facto cemeteries.
Mayan Indian communities across Guatemala struggled with the conflicting demands of tradition – which demands the recovery of bodies and decent burial - with the shifting fields of mud. Many now say the vast mudflows will have to be declared graveyards.
“They (experts) have advised us not to dig anymore, because there is a great danger” that the still-soaked earth may collapse again, said Uvaldo Najera, a Tacana municipal employee.
Officials said Nobel Peace Prize laureate Rigoberta Menchu Tum would travel to some of the hardest-hit villages, like Panabaj on the shores of Lake Atitlan, to hold consultations with Indian leaders on how to reconcile cultural traditions, while keeping the living from being injured in attempts to recover the dead.
An estimated 250 people are still believed to be encased in vast mud flows in Panabaj. More than 770 confirmed deaths and hundreds of missing in Central America and Mexico.
Indians leaders say they are exhausted by the days spent digging for victims since the Wednesday mudslides and are worried about diseases from the decomposing corpses.
“Panabaj will no longer exist,” said mayor Diego Esquina, referring to the hamlet covered by a half-mile wide mudflow as much as 15 to 20 feet thick. “We are asking that it be declared a cemetery. We are tired.
“The bodies are so rotted that they can no longer be identified. They will only bring disease.”
Many of the missing will apparently simply be declared dead, and the ground they rest in declared hallowed ground. About 160 bodies have been recovered in Panabaj and nearby towns, and most have been buried in mass graves.
Promised sniffer dogs trained to detect bodies failed to arrive in time, and “we don’t even know where to dig anymore in the immensity of the mudflows”, Esquina said.
Hundreds of Mayan villagers who had swarmed over the vast mudslides with shovels, picks and axes to dig for victims in previous days gave up their efforts yesterday, overwhelmed by the task.
Vice President Eduardo Stein said steps were being taken to give towns “legal permission to declare the buried areas cemeteries” as “a sanitary measure”.
Meanwhile, thousands of hungry and injured survivors mobbed helicopters delivering the first food aid to communities that have been cut off from the outside world for nearly a week.
Helicopters – including private craft, and US Blackhawks and Chinooks – fanned out across the nation to evacuate the wounded and bring supplies to more than 100 communities still cut off by the mudslides and flooding.
Some communities along Guatemala’s Pacific coast have been cut off from the outside world for almost a week, and when aid helicopters finally arrived, hungry and desperate villagers grabbed wildly at bags of flour, rice and sugar.
Scores of foreign tourists were evacuated by foot and by helicopter from isolated communities ringing Lake Atitlan, a popular destination for US and European travellers. Some tourists had joined shoulder to shoulder with Mayan Indians in traditional cotton blouses and broad sashes to dig for missing victims.
Meanwhile, hundreds of people were forced to evacuate after a weekend of drenching rain washed out roads and flooded homes in US states from North Carolina to New Hampshire. At least three deaths were blamed on the storm.
New Hampshire governor John Lynch declared a state of emergency yesterday and called in 500 National Guard members to assist in flood relief. Transportation Commissioner Carol Murray said police and highway crews blocked damaged roads before dawn, a move that probably prevented injuries.
The most severe flooding in New Hampshire was in Keene, where some major roads were under as much as four to six feet of water. Keene Fire Chief Gary Lamoureaux estimated 30 to 40% of the downtown area was under water.
