CUBA: Two Hurricanes in Less than Two Weeks

By Dalia Acosta Reprint | | Print |

Dalia Acosta

HAVANA, Oct 2 2002 (IPS) - The passage of two hurricanes through Cuba in less than two weeks confirms the start of a period of intense cyclonic activity that could last 20 or 25 years, say experts.

On Tuesday, Hurricane Lili followed nearly the same path across western Cuba that Hurricane Isidore took on Sep 20, leaving more families without a home and new damages to the economy, although fortunately no one was killed.

The two storms reached maximum winds of 160 kms an hour, and both were classified as category two hurricanes on the Saffir- Simpson scale, out of a maximum of five.

”I hope this is the last,” said José Rubiera, director of the Meteorology Institute, in his report to the public on the damages caused by Lili. ”We don’t know what’s going to happen, but we are on the alert.”

The cyclone season in the Caribbean basin stretches from Jun 1 to Nov 30. Cuba is one of the region’s vulnerable nations, because of its geographic location. But it had not been hit by two hurricanes in one year since 1966.

Between 1799 and 2001, the island suffered the direct impact of two or more hurricanes in one season on 21 occasions. But four hurricanes were reported in 1886 and 1909, and three in 1895, 1906 and 1933.

After three decades of ”relative calm, Isidore and Lili confirmed that we are looking at a new phase of renewal of cyclone activity,” especially in the Caribbean region, said Ramón Pérez, with the National Climate Centre.

Pérez is the lead author of a study on the hurricanes that have swept through the Cuban archipelago in the past 200 years. According to the estimates of experts on tropical storms, the new phase of stepped-up cyclonic activity could last until 2020 or 2025.

Hurricane Lili forced authorities to evacuate more than 362,000 people and 410,000 head of livestock.

There is no estimate yet of the economic losses that came on top of those caused just 11 days earlier by Isidore, although they were considered minimal in comparison with the 1.8 billion dollars in damages provoked by Hurricane Michelle last November.

”Everyone here knows what to do when a hurricane is coming, and the television repeats the information over and over and over. Still, no one ignores the dangers, especially because of the risk of building collapses,” Mercedes Ramírez, who lives in a Havana apartment building, told IPS.

The rainfall brought by Isidore in the western part of the country was not heavy in Havana, which is located on the eastern end of the island, although there were more than 50 partial housing cave-ins, said José Luis Columbié, a housing official in the province.

In the 20th century, Cuba was hit by around 100 tropical storms, according to a national report presented at a conference on local preparedness and risk reduction in the Caribbean basin, held Sep 17-19 in Havana.

Civil defence agency statistics cited by the national report indicate that 2.15 million of Cuba’s 11 million people comprise the ”vulnerable population in high-risk areas.”

Of that total, 920,000 are in danger of dams or reservoirs bursting, 650,000 are vulnerable to housing collapse, 540,000 are threatened by floods, and 45,000 are at risk of getting caught in landslides.

A study carried out on coastal flooding identifies various levels of danger, vulnerability and risk for 244 ”population centres” (63 urban and 181 rural) where 1.4 million people live in just over 350,100 housing units.

”These settlements are located below one metre above sea level, and less than 1,000 metres from the shore,” states the report.

While the greatest concern in towns and cities is the danger of housing collapses, the biggest worry in rural areas is the loss of crops, which are threatened year after year by long periods of drought followed by heavy rains or strong winds.

”We live off of what we grow,” said María García, who lives in a farming village in central Cuba. ”Last year, we lost our entire rice and bean harvest to the hurricane. First it was the drought, and then came Michelle.”

The tough economic situation led García and her husband to move to Havana for a few months, for the first time in their lives. ”My daughter wants us to come and live with her, but what would we do in the city?” commented the 74-year-old farmer.

CUBA: Two Hurricanes in Less than Two Weeks

By Dalia Acosta Reprint | | Print |

Dalia Acosta

HAVANA, Oct 2 2002 (IPS) - The passage of two hurricanes through Cuba in less than two weeks confirms the start of a period of intense cyclonic activity that could last 20 or 25 years, say experts.
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