Link to article: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/11/6/central-america-still-on-high-alert-as-hurricane-eta-kills-dozens
Heavy rains continue across the region creating major floods and mudslides. Hurricane Eta has brought copious amounts of rain, flooding communities from Panama to Guatemala. The death toll across Central America has risen to about 57 people. The storm started off in Nicaragua as a Category-4 hurricane and by the next Tuesday had become more of a vast tropical rainstorm but the area stayed on high alert due to the heavy rains.
Forecasters predict the aftermath of tropical depression is going to regain mobility and make its way to Cuba and the Gulf of Mexico by next week.
The President of Guatemala said a heavily soaked mountainside in the central part of the country slid down onto the town of San Cristobal Verapaz, covering and destroying homes and killing at least 25 people. Two other slides in Huehuetenango had killed at least 12 more and five others had been killed in smaller slides in Guatemala. These are only a few examples of the terrible deaths central Americans have faced due to flooding and landslides. Many small families have been killed due to landslides burying homes. Honduras’s emergency management agency stated about 457 homes had been damaged, most by floodwaters. There were 41 communities cut off by washed-out roads.
The US National Hurricane Center forecast that parts of Nicaragua and Honduras could receive 15 to 25 inches of rain. It is predicted that the rains will regain some strength in the Caribbean and become a tropical storm again. Then, Hurricane Eta is predicted to inch towards Cuba and Florida, and gather several inches of rain in the next five to seven days
Informing about Hurricane Eta is essential, especially when so many people have died and are missing. Also, since the storm is moving and progressing, to understand the previous damage it has caused in other countries can help the future areas it is heading towards prepare for the worst. Hurricane Eta has already had a tremendous impact on the countries in South America because of the physical damage it caused, along with lives lost and a plummeting economy on the horizon. This hurricane will have multiple negative impacts surrounding economic growth, destroyed homes, lives lost, damage to outdoor property, and more.