Torrential rains kill 40 in Guatemala

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GUATEMALA CITY ? At least 18 people were killed in Guatemala on Saturday, including a dozen on a bus that was buried in a landslide, as heavy rains lashed the Central American nation and southern Mexico.

A dozen people died when the bus they were traveling on was suddenly engulfed by mud around 8 a.m. on the Inter-American highway 50 miles outside of the Guatemalan capital, emergency workers said.

Another six people were killed in separate incidents, Guatemalan President Alvaro Colom told reporters.

Tropical weather systems in both the Pacific and the Gulf of Mexico have triggered torrential rains throughout Guatemala and southern Mexico.

Constant rain in the region over the last week has left hillsides saturated with water and with more precipitation forecast for Sunday officials in both Guatemala and Mexico are taking precautions against landslides.

Heavy flooding in the Mexican Gulf state of Tabasco forced thousands of people from their homes. Authorities in neighboring Chiapas and Oaxaca states, which border Guatemala, and the Gulf state of Veracruz also reported serious flooding.

"The bad weather in the southeast has caused the worst rainy season on record. We are marshaling aid for the affected area," wrote Mexican President Felipe Calderon on his Twitter page.

The state power monopoly opened floodgates on some hydroelectric dams in the region, worsening the flooding in some low-lying areas.

No deaths were blamed on the flooding in Mexico.

Mexico's state oil company Pemex, which has extensive oil and gas operations in Tabasco state and offshore in the Gulf of Mexico, reported no problems with production.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39012296/ns/world_news-americas/

 

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Re: Torrential rains kill 18 in Guatemala

Re: Torrential rains kill 18 in Guatemala

Yesterday about 7 a.m., which was a system of low pressure turned into the tropical thunderstorm ?gatha, which caused an intense rain that stopped more than 16 missing persons for the overflowing of rivers, which puts in risk communities and bridges; slides, blockades of highways, damages in housings and millionaire economic losses still without quantifying.
Until 22 a.m. of yesterday, the Coordinating National one for the Reduction of Disasters (Conred) it was bringing eight dead persons: four in Almolonga, Quetzaltenango; and four in the establishment The Cross, zone 3 of the capital.
Nevertheless, the Conred was not adding up four persons who perished because of a deslave in the village The Paj?n, Saint Catarina Pinula, Guatemala, which drama they received the cameras of Free Press.
Other not confirmed information brings the death of Francisco Cux, worker of Coroad that 210 remained buried in the kilometer, between San Francisco The High place and Santa Maria Chiquimula, Quetzaltenango.
Two kilometers forward of this place, another two neighbors would have remained buried, reported the Voluntary Firemen.

Between other tragedies brought in the capital the death of eight persons is: the four of the village The Paj?n, Saint Catarina Pinula, and four in the establishment The Cross, zone 3. Because of the rain also the worn La Paz was closed, and in the Roosevelt floods registered.
The Conred brought the subsidence of a house of three flats in the zone 2, from what one declared emergency in the area.
The access to the capital also turned out to be affected with the blockade of the freeway of Pal?n-Escuintla.
In addition to the personal losses, the destruction observed largely of the national territory, with deslaves, floods and overflowing of rivers that support in risk several departments like Retalhuleu, Suchitep?quez and San Marcos.
The meteorological phenomenon also has caused millionaire economic losses, although they even have not been quantified, due to the destruction of bridges, housings and crops, between other damages.
In these risks, there is always those who take advantage of the circumstances. This way it was confirmed by Mayra Soto, director of the Direction of Attention and Assistance to the Consumer, who told that they have received denunciations of speculation in the prices of the basic basket.

http://www.politicagt.com/lluvia-deja-12-muertos-y-miles-de-damnificados/

 

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Re: Torrential rains kill 18 in Guatemala

Re: Torrential rains kill 18 in Guatemala

Guatemala flood emergency called by country?s president

President Alvaro Colom of Guatemala has had to declare a state of emergency after fourteen people died on the weekend due to heavy rains which caused landslides.

Six people died on a bus and four inside a home when the latest rains triggered two deadly landslides.

One of the landslides swept away the bus on a road near central Chimaltenango city killing at least 10 people and injuring 20.

The other killed four people inside a house in western Quetzaltenango.

President Colom has said his top priority is to deal with recent storm damage across Guatemala, which has cost at least 500 million dollars.

Another 24 hours of heavy rain has been forecast throughout most of the country.

http://www.bruneinews.net/story/681170

 

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Re: Torrential rains kill 40 in Guatemala

Guatemala landslides kill dozens, toll seen rising


(Reuters) - A massive landslide buried a crowd trying to dig out a bus from deep mud on Sunday, killing at least 22 people, with dozens more feared dead, as torrential rains battered Guatemala.

Emergency workers recovered 22 bodies from the landslide on a major highway in Cumbre de Alaska northwest of the capital, and they warned it could take two days to dig out all the victims.

"A wall of earth fell on a bus and around 100 local people organized themselves to dig out the victims," said fire department spokesman Sergio Vasquez. "Then another landslide came along and buried them."

Rescue workers used shovels and pickaxes to dig bodies from the deep mud and local residents wrapped victims in blankets and carried them away.

Recovery efforts were abandoned when heavy rain struck the region again, sending people fleeing from the rain-saturated hillsides.

Another landslide later on Sunday on a different highway slammed into a small bus, killing at least one person and injuring several others.

On Saturday, 12 people were killed when another bus was buried in a landslide. Six more people were killed in other incidents on Saturday, raising the weekend death toll to at least 41.

"It's a national tragedy," President Alvaro Colom told a news conference, adding that nearly 12,000 people had been evacuated to emergency shelters. "It's painful that poor people are paying the price of natural disasters."

Photographs of the bus that wrecked on Saturday in Cumbre de Alaska showed its roof crushed by a huge pile of earth and rock that almost completely covered the vehicle.

More than 30 separate landslides cut the Inter-American Highway, one of Guatemala's main roads, within a single 30-mile (50-km) stretch, local media reported.

Emergency services officials warned further rain was expected on Sunday and Monday.

Colom appealed to people to stay off the nation's highways due to the threat of further landslides and said rescue efforts would be suspended if more rain fell in the affected areas.

More than 150 people died in Guatemala in May when Tropical Storm Agatha drenched Central America, triggering landslides.

Record amounts of rain have fallen in parts of Guatemala and southeastern Mexico this year. Thousands of people in the Mexican Gulf of Mexico state of Tabasco have been forced from their homes by flooding.

Water levels behind some dams in the region have risen so high that floodgates have been opened.

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE68404Q20100906

 

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Re: Torrential rains kill 40 in Guatemala

Guatemala: Informative bulletin Not. 1111 - DEPARTMENT OF RETALHULEU SUPPORTS RED ALERT

Because most of the municipality of Champerico stays overwhelmed and that it has been necessary to lodge to a persons' big quantity, the authorities keep the Center of Emergency operations qualified-COE - and activated the Red Alert in the whole department.
Product of the rains of last hours has been necessary to attend to 42 incidents in the department of Retalhuleu, which they have put to 6 thousand 509 persons in situation of risk, who represent 21 per cent of the whole at national level. The majority of these persons are in the municipality of Champerico, with a whole of 2 thousand 409-37 per cent-, you present yourself in risk; followed by municipality of Retalhuleu, with 2 thousand 286-35 per cent-; and San Andr?s Villa Seca, with a whole of 1 thousand 814 you present yourself in risk,-28 per cent-.
Also, 1 thousand 016 brings housings with light damages, particularly for the floods, which in some places overcame a meter high. In the whole department it has been necessary to evacuate a whole of 2 thousand 281 persons, who represent 22 per cent of the whole of persons evacuated at national level in the last 48 hours.
The municipality of Champerico is located with the biggest number of lodged persons, whose recent reports indicate a whole of 1 thousand 536 persons.
In the municipality of Retalhuleu one has given hostel to 364 persons and in San Andr?s Villa Seca to 282 persons.
This information changes constantly because the persons remain in the place while it diminishes the water level in his hearths. According to the reports of the National Institute of Seismology, Vulcanology, Meteorology and Hydrology ? INSIVUMEH-, in the department of Retalhuleu piled up rains of 289 millimeters registered last Saturday, the 04th of September.
The institutions of the System of the Coordinating National one for the Reduction of Disasters ? CONRED-, continue with the monitoring of the principal tributaries of the country, between them the rivers Ocosito, Samal?, Sis and Nahualate, whose basins have influence on the department of Retalhuleu. Today, according to reports of the Executive Secretary of the CONRED, these tributaries have diminished his levels.
It suggests to the population of this one department to take the necessary measures of prevention and to avoid to put his life in risk. Of equal form, to attend on all the indications that there express the departmental and municipal authorities, who have to his charge the attention of the incidents that are caused in the place.

The SE-CONRED will keep on moving for the corresponding means any new information that is expressed about this department.

http://www.humanitariannews.org/201...partamento-de-retalhuleu-mantiene-alerta-roja

 

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Re: Torrential rains kill 40 in Guatemala

Informative bulletin Not. 1114 - Persons affected by rains promote more than 50 thousand

The Executive Secretary of the Coordinating National one for the Reduction of Disasters ?-SE-CONRED-, informs about the last numbers that the rains have stopped in the country, where there register 50 thousand 634 persons affected by floods, destructions and slides.
For the time being 255 incidents are brought where it is believed that 43 thousand 043 persons find in risk, 254 harmed ones, 11 thousand 495 evacuees, 9 thousand 160 lodged ones, 16 missing persons, 56 injured men and 44 deceased persons, after the rains registered from the last Friday, the 03rd of September of the present year.
On the evening of last Sunday 28 of the highway registered a destruction in the kilometer to the Atlantic Ocean, jurisdiction of San Jose of the Gulf, Guatemala, where persons brought 1 died and 26 hurt persons who were moved to a welfare center.
In the kilometer 171 of the Inter-American Highway in Totonicap?n, the actions of search and victims' recovery continue, in the place there are the bodies of help and personnel of the Team of Immediate Response ? ERI-, of the SE-CONRED. At the sector one will keep on being employed with machinery to mobilize the material of the destruction and to realize the search, due to the latent risk for a new destruction at the stated direction.

The persons' quantity that they find lodged promotes 14 thousand 291 lodged ones in 159 centers or lounges that have been enabled. Of this whole, 9 thousand 303 are for the rains of the weekend where the authorities enabled 94 hostels to attend to the affected ones.
The SE-CONRED continues with the monitoring of the areas with record of water saturation, using the remote sensors and analysis and interpretation of images satelitales to have reference of sectors with major susceptibility of slides at national level.
The monitoring of the conditions hidrometeorol?gicas at national level they are supported for the SE-CONRED and the National Institute of Seismology, Vulcanology, Meteorology and Hydrology ? INSIVUMEH-, recommending to the population to be you commit an outrage against the indications that the authorities announce across the media of social communication.

http://conred.gob.gt/index.php/bole...ectadas-por-lluvias-ascienden-a-mas-de-50-mil