Cuba's second largest city devastated by Sandy, half of homes lost roofs, 15,400 destroyed

[flamingdem]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/feedarticle/10505964

* Please be aware of the incredible toll Sandy took on our neighbor to the South. This is a time the USA could and should make a gesture, an offer to help. In Santiago, Cuba's second largest city half of the homes lost their roofs. Time to address climate change.

Yolanda Tabio, a native of Santiago, said she had never seen anything like it in all her 64 years: Broken hotel and shop windows, trees blown over onto houses, people picking through piles of debris for a scrap of anything to cover their homes. On Sunday, she sought solace in faith.

"The Mass was packed. Everyone crying," said Tabio, whose house had no electricity, intermittent phone service and only murky water coming out of the tap on Monday. "I think it will take five to ten years to recover. ... But we're alive."

Sandy came onshore early Thursday just west of Santiago, a city of about 500,000 people in agricultural southeastern Cuba. It is the island's deadliest storm since 2005's Hurricane Dennis, a category 5 monster that killed 16 people and did $2.4 billion in damage. More than 130,000 homes were damaged by Sandy, including 15,400 that were destroyed, Granma said.

"It really shocked me to see all that has been destroyed and to know that for many people, it's the effort of a whole lifetime," said Maria Caridad Lopez, a media relations officer at the Roman Catholic Archdiocese in Santiago. "And it disappears in just three hours."

Lopez said several churches in the area collapsed and nearly all suffered at least minor damage. That included the Santiago cathedral as well as one of the holiest sites in Cuba, the Sanctuary of the Virgin del Cobre. Sandy's winds blew out its stained glass windows and damaged its massive doors.







Donations can be made via MEDICC:

MEDICC
@mediccglobal

Medical Education Cooperation with Cuba, a non-profit working to build bridges among the US, Cuban, & global health communities aimed at better health outcomes.

Oakland, CA · http://www.medicc.org

[justiceischeap]

1. Holy Hey Zeus!

Can't tell what's damage and what' natural in that 2nd photo.

[flamingdem]

3. Truly, what stands out is the description of the intensity of the storm

Looks like the East Coast only got a percent of the fury.

Here are some of the shots of the city before Sandy

This beautiful church was damaged:

[greytdemocrat]

2. Ouch...that is terrible.

[flamingdem]

4. Donations if you're so inclined can be made via Medicc

Go here for more info and donations:

http://medicc.org/ns/?p=627

direct donation link:
https://npo1.networkforgood.org/Donate/Donate.aspx?npoSubscriptionId=5278&code=Website%20Donations

** Medicc is a fantastic group that operates in Cuba and has done heroic work in Haiti


MEDICC and Global Links Send Hurricane Relief to Santiago, Cuba

October 29, 2012—Global Links and Medical Education Cooperation with Cuba (MEDICC), today launched a joint humanitarian campaign to send hurricane relief to Santiago, Cuba, the country’s second largest city, devastated by Hurricane Sandy on October 25th.

As the US eastern seaboard counts severe losses and begins recovery from Hurricane Sandy, Cubans are digging out from the same storm— with far fewer resources at their disposal. To restore power, 72 crews of linesmen work day and night. In the fields, farmers salvage the crops they can. Trucks and trains haul food, 4,000 tons of cement and some 84,000 sheets of roofing eastward to Santiago. The province—including Cuba’s second largest city of the same name and the country’s highest mountain range—was the hardest hit. Today, over one million people there struggle to pick up their homes and lives amidst the ruins.

MEDICC and Global Links, with the aid of the Pan American Health Organization, are sending medical supplies and equipment, chlorine tablets, hospital furnishings and critical medical books for the medical school to Santiago and other provinces directly hit by the storm. The two organizations have a strong history of successful humanitarian collaboration, including continuing support for building a sustainable public health system in Haiti after the 2010 earthquake.

Global Links and MEDICC are accepting donations for this relief effort. You can help the people of Santiago recover, your donations giving them the extra courage it takes to face such a disaster. Go to MEDICC to donate online.

Global Links is a Pittsburgh-based not-for-profit medical relief and development organization dedicated to promoting environmental stewardship in the region, while improving the health of underserved people in resource-poor communities throughout the hemisphere and here at home. Global Links has provided more than $176 million in critical medical aid to developing nations since 1989. www.globallinks.org

MEDICC is a non-profit Oakland, California-based organization working since 1997 to enhance cooperation among the US, Cuban and global health communities aimed at better health outcomes and equity. MEDICC publishes MEDICC Review, the only peer-reviewed journal on Cuban health and medicine and produced the award-winning documentary ¡Salud! . MEDICC coordinates educational exchanges in Cuba for US health professionals and supports students and graduates of Havana’s Latin American Medical School. www.medicc.org

[malaise]

5. Jamaica was really lucky although we have pockets in areas looking like that

Last edited Tue Oct 30, 2012, 04:44 PM - Edit history (1)

Santiago was hit by a strengthening Sandy

The bad news - more rain is on the way for both Jamaica and Cuba

[flamingdem]

6. Oh no really!? I imagine they're just starting to set up camps

and tents. They just don't have the resources to deal with this. In his second term Obama must address this historical error of treating our neighbors to the South like US property, enough already. And enough of the term communist to demagog when what they are is nationalistic. They'll make it through but they don't deserve this bullying from the USA.

[shireen]

7. And Haiti, more than 60 dead

Haiti is mostly tent cities. I'm amazed that the death toll isn't higher. The devastation in Haiti and Cuba, and other surrounding countries, is so sad.

[flamingdem]

8. So much cause to worry as this becomes a regular kind of event

It's just not possible to sustain this -- one glimmer of progress - the "petrohouses" build by Venezuela survived intact. They are made with PVC and built to withstand the worst weather. So that's one area to work on, it would be easier if the US could cooperate with Venezuela and Cuba and other countries, things could get done, things need to be developed to address climate change.

[sinkingfeeling]

9. Terrible loss to people who have so little.

[flamingdem]

10. Yes, Santiago is so poor

Havana is wildly rich by comparison. Such a shame because they have recently invested in building up the public spaces and shopping areas, partly for tourism but to their credit mostly for the residents to enjoy. All of that seems so fragile. Gone in three hours no doubt. A lot of the tourism installations have been damaged and the church, Caridad de Cobre, is the most important symbol of Cuba because it's the Virgin of Charity's church, Caridad del Cobre, Ochun in Afro-Cuban religion, a mixed African-Spanish figure that is the number one Saint there, and Hemingway donated his Nobel Prize medal to that church, and to "her".

Having spent a lot of time in Cuba it's amazing how much the Cubans do with so little, but this is just crazy, in Santiago they have to start over, they have next to nada.