Haiti: Tras La Tormenta

(CBS/AP) Hurricane Tomas was downgraded to a tropical storm early Saturday as it passed over the Turks and Caicos Islands, losing steam a day after battering seaside towns in Haiti.

Haiti was pummeled with 85 mph winds and from five to ten inches of rain. A foot of standing water fills the capital of Port-au-Prince, where four people are dead and two are missing. ...

It's been raining all night in Port-au-Prince and, for earthquake refugees living in tent cities, it has been a miserable night, reports CBS News producer John Bentley.

There over a million people living in the portable structures, and the rain has been coming down since the sun went down. The streets are flooded and a lot of rivers and streams are overflowing, causing a lot of problems. But as far as Hurricane Tomas goes, Haiti dodged a bullet - the eye missed Port-au-Prince.

If they didn't get the strong winds and major flooding they were worried about, the other problem will be how the storm affects the water and sewage supplies - important as Haiti battles a cholera epidemic in which 400 people have died.

source

The details:

On Friday, panicked residents fled a coastal city in Haiti that had been slammed twice already this decade by killer floods. The hurricane spared most earthquake-refugee camps in the capital but battered a seaside town to the west that was nearly destroyed by January's earthquake.

Coming ashore at Haiti's far southwestern edge, Tomas slammed the coastline with 85-mph winds and killed at least four people with storm surge and rains.

It then flooded camps harboring earthquake refugees, turning some into squalid islands in Leogane, a town west of the capital that lost 90 percent of its buildings and thousands of people in the Jan. 12 quake. Two people were missing in the city.

Tomas turned streets of the capital, Port-au-Prince, into canals of flowing garbage. The storm largely spared the city's vast homeless encampments, however, allaying fears that an estimated 1.3 million displaced people would suffer from high winds and rain on hillsides and in parks and streets.

Haitians had high hopes that the storm would move on before triggering floods in Gonaives, a northwestern coastal city that completely flooded in 2004 and again in 2008, killing thousands. As rains fell on the city's slums of Raboteau and Jubilee, people living in the low-lying areas began heading for high ground.

"It's not a major flood, but it's flooding in some areas," Doctors Without Borders spokesman Francois Servranckx told The Associated Press.

And so the storm has passed Haiti. It has left a new disaster in its wake. And Haiti will now, again, fade from the traditional media and disappear behind a curtain. That would make this a great time to remember the suffering in Haiti and to send a donation-- even small donations mount up-- to Doctors Without Borders.

May all in Haiti be free from suffering. May all be well. May all be safe.

A Slow Motion Train Wreck: Haiti

A picture is worth a thousand rants. The big island to the right of Cuba is Hispaniola. And the country on the west side of that island, the country that is about to be run over by Hurricane Tomas, is Haiti.

What do we know about Haiti's current situation? Well, it's dire. The Earthquake destroyed the infrastructure. Many thousands of people are homeless or in shelters that don't really provide shelter or in badly damaged, unreliable housing. There's a cholera outbreak. And now, Hurricane Tomas is coming. If it arrives with any intensity at all, and it appears that it will, it will create even more havoc: loss of life, loss of shelter, loss of food, loss of drinking water. Medicine will be even more scarce, and even more people will need it. The cholera will expand. There will be flooding. Unsanitary conditions will abound. Because of extensive deforestation, there will be mudslides. Roads that are barely repaired from the earthquake will again be impassable. Hospitals will again be overwhelmed and unable to care for the injured and ill.

I know that tomorrow is Election Day in the US, and that the Traditional Media are all focused on the T-party and the horserace aspects of the electoral process. But please. Could we please also spread the word on what is happening in Haiti and urge our fellow writers and readers to begin making donations to Doctors Without Borders? That could actually save some lives.

Haiti: Yet Another Disaster Lurks

Hasn't Haiti suffered enough? Centuries of grotesque exploitation and purposeful neglect. And most recently, the devastating earthquake. Then an inadequate relief effort that has left thousands and thousands homeless or stuck in makeshift, flimsy camps, without adequate housing, food, medicine or sanitation. An outbreak of Cholera. And now, on top of all of that, the unimaginable: a possible Hurricane this week. And a very big one at that.

The model predicts the storm will make a right turn. In fact, almost all of the models say it will make a right turn. And when it does, it will come ashore in Haiti. This will cause loss of life, flooding, further outbreaks of disease, loss of even temporary shelter, unavailability of food. A nightmare for those living in Haiti.

I've asked before that we contribute to Doctors Without Borders, specifically for Haiti Aid. Now I'm asking again. What else can be done? What else can I or you do?

Money for specialized aid is extremely important. As important, and perhaps more important in the long run, I think is for US citizens to being to know Haiti's history and the story of its relationship to the US, in other words, the story of how it got to be the way it is now. I'm sure we all realize that Haiti didn't get to its present horrendous situation all by its self, without a lot of US and European "help." To ferret how all of this has happened, a great starting point is this dailyKos essay by allie123. It's part of a series. Each piece is important on its own. Please take the time to read them.

For now, though, please consider an immediate, small donation to Doctors Without Borders. It might save some lives in Haiti. It might alleviate some of the suffering.