Daily Black Immigrant News
At least 28 people have died after Hurricane Julia caused rain and landslides in several Latin American countries, including Guatemala and El Salvador.
Guatemala’s disaster prevention agency said five people died after a hillside collapsed on their home in Alta Verapaz province, burying them. And in the province of Huehuetenango, near Mexico, nine people died, including a soldier involved in the rescue work.
Authorities in El Salvador said five Salvadoran army soldiers died after a wall collapsed in a house where they sought refuge in the town of Comasagua, where hundreds of police and soldiers have been conducting anti-gang raids. Another soldier was wounded.
Two more people died in El Salvador’s eastern city of Guatajiagua after heavy rains caused a wall of their home to collapse. Another man in El Salvador died when he was swept away by a current and another died when a tree fell on him.
Rivers overflowed their banks and El Salvador declared a state of emergency and opened 80 storm shelters.
In neighboring Honduras, a 22-year-old woman died when she was swept away by currents, and three people died when their boat capsized or capsized in northern Honduras. A man in Nicaragua was killed by a falling tree.
Julia hit Nicaragua’s central Caribbean coast early Sunday as a hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 135 km/h (85 mph) and survived passage over the country’s mountainous terrain, entering the Pacific late in the day as a tropical storm.
By Monday, Julia had moved inland in Guatemala and winds had decreased to 50 km/h (30 mph).
The US National Hurricane Center (NHC) said Julia was centered about 130 km (80 miles) west-northwest of Guatemala City and was moving west-northwest at 24 km/h (15 mph).
The NHC said flooding and mudslides were possible across Central America and southern Mexico through Tuesday, with the storm expected to bring up to 380 mm (15 inches) of rain to isolated areas.
NewsAmericasNow.com
