Haiti facing storm 'catastrophe'
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Friday, September 05, 2008
Haiti faces a "catastrophe" after being hit by a series of storms in recent weeks, President Rene Preval has said.
Three storms in less than 21 days have killed 170 people, Haitian officials say. The British Red Cross says some 250,000 people are stranded.
Tropical Storm Hanna killed 61 people and caused floods several metres deep, stranding people on rooftops.
Mr Preval warned that Hanna could prove even more deadly than Hurricane Jeanne, which killed more than 3,000 in 2004.
Hanna swirled over Haiti for four days, dumping massive amounts of rain, blowing down fruit trees and swamping tin-roofed houses.
A team from the American Red Cross flew over Gonaives
An AP reporter in the city said safe drinking water was in very short supply, and fetid carcasses of drowned farm animals were strewn in soupy floodwaters.
Help was arriving in the area, with UN troops picking people from rooftops and Spain announcing that a planeload of aid was being flown in from Panama.
But floodwaters were frustrating efforts to distribute food, the UN said.
The British Red Cross announced it was launching an appeal, saying the needs of Haiti were "massive".
Red Cross workers were also helping residents of the Turks and Caicos Islands, north of Haiti, rebuild after Hanna ripped through there on Monday.
"Our volunteers have been supporting the shelters here with food and shelter management, transporting people to hospital, and handing out tarpaulins to help keep roofs on," said the organisation's Clive Evans, on the islands.
"There are abandoned cars everywhere, overturned boats, uprooted trees, downed power lines and flooded roads."
Earlier, Mr Preval said he would hold emergency talks with donor countries to appeal for aid.
At 1500 GMT on Thursday, Hanna was about 400km (245 miles) east of Nassau and moving north-west, the US National Hurricane Center (NHC) said.
There are fears it could become a hurricane by the time it hits land along the US coast on Saturday, but the storm's uncertain path means officials are holding off ordering an evacuation.
Some residents of North and South Carolina have already moved boats and booked inland hotel rooms.
Separately, storm Ike has strengthened rapidly into an extremely powerful Category Four hurricane in the open Atlantic, the NHC says.
Haiti was first drenched by Tropical Storm Fay, before Hurricane Gustav wreaked havoc last week, with torrential rainfall over heavily deforested and hilly terrain causing floods and mudslides.