SAN CRISTOBAL VERAPAZ (Guatemala) • Rescue workers clambered over treacherous roads buried in mud and rubble to reach a remote village in Guatemala swamped by a devastating storm over the weekend that has killed and led to the disappearance of dozens of people across Central America and southern Mexico.
Storm Eta's torrential downpours toppled trees, engorged swift-moving rivers and ripped down parts of a mountainside above the village of Queja in the central Guatemalan region of Alta Verapaz, burying dozens of people in their homes.
The heavy rain is still triggering mudslides in Queja, halting rescue efforts.
Carrying a small child in her arms, Ms Gloria Cac, a member of the Poqomchi' people and a resident of Queja, said 22 family members were missing after the mountain collapsed onto the village.
Mr Francisco Muz, a retired general who was helping in the rescue efforts, said the landslides have not stopped because of the continuous rain in the mountains.
"At ground zero, there is a terrible reality... this national tragedy is centred in San Cristobal Verapaz, in Queja village," Mr Muz said.
The devastating weather front spread destruction from Panama to Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras and Mexico, and has continued to push the death toll higher in those countries. It now stands at more than 65.
Panama's government increased its tally after floods and landslides killed 17 people there. Two miners were reported killed in Nicaragua, while in southern Costa Rica, a landslide killed a Costa Rican woman and an American man in a house. A man was killed in El Salvador, and Honduras has reported 25 dead and two missing.
In the Mexican state of Chiapas, flooding has killed 19 people, many swept up by rivers whose banks burst, said the state authorities. North of Chiapas in Tabasco state, the deluges killed two more people, the federal government said.
The devastation harked back to Hurricane Mitch, which killed some 10,000 people in Central America in 1998.
Eta, one of the fiercest storms to hit Central America in years, struck Nicaragua as a Category 4 hurricane last Tuesday with winds of 240kmh.
Now downgraded to a tropical storm, it has since moved north over the Caribbean Sea and yesterday made landfall along the south-central coast of Cuba and was forecast to produce dangerous storm surge, flash floods and strong winds over portions of Cuba and Florida, the United States National Hurricane Centre said.
Hundreds of thousands of Cubans began evacuating their homes last Saturday as Eta closed in.
Fresh landslides late on Saturday halted Guatemalan rescue workers' efforts to dig through mud of up to 15m deep in Queja. The head of a local emergency worker team said rescue efforts had been called off, possibly permanently.
Emergency worker Juan Alberto Leal said: "We are coordinating so that all the personnel are evacuated in the morning because we can't work there. If we stay, lives will be lost."
Mr Leal said relentless rain was making the soil too loose to work in safely, and new landslides were forcing workers to flee to safer ground in the village.
Some 55 soldiers, 25 firefighters and 15 police officers had earlier managed to reach the site of the disaster and were using shovels and picks to search for survivors and retrieve bodies.
So far, three bodies have been recovered. Army spokesman Colonel Ruben Tellez said it could take months to unearth all the homes.
Guatemalan disaster relief agency Conred said 103 people were still missing and 21 confirmed dead in the country.
Taiwan donated US$200,000 (S$269,000) and the US gave US$120,000 for the purchase of food and drinking water, Guatemalan President Alejandro Giammattei said.
"The number of people in the shelters has continued to grow and we haven't finished rescuing people," he added.
REUTERS
