22185: (Chamberlain) Caribbean Storms-Survivors (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

   By PETER PRENGAMAN

   BARAHONA, Dominican Republic, May 31 (AP) -- With scrapes, deep
lacerations and bruises all over her body, Janelle Perez lay dazed in a
hospital bed, haunted by memories of how she survived floods that swept
away her family and destroyed entire towns along the Dominican-Haitian
border.
   When pounding rains and a bulging river engulfed the Dominican farming
town of Jimani a week ago, Perez, her husband and three children scrambled
onto their tin roof in the early morning darkness.
   But after a while a gush of water leveled the small wooden home and sent
the family tumbling into the floodwaters. The next thing Perez remembers,
she was buried up to her neck in mud.
   "I thought I was dead," said Perez, 42, as she rolled her head back and
forth as if trying to wake up from a nightmare. "They dug me out with a
pickax."
   Perez was recovering Sunday in a public hospital in Barahona, about 75
miles southeast of Jimani.
   A week after the disaster, hospitalized survivors are struggling to deal
with their traumas and figure out what they'll do when they are released.
Many are trying to pay for treatment but they've lost all their belongings.
Relatives who could have chipped in are dead or missing.
   According to official death tolls, the floods killed more than 1,400 in
the Dominican Republic and Haiti, and with hundreds still missing,
officials expected the toll to climb.
   Rescue workers found Perez 36 hours after her home collapsed almost
buried in mud about 2 miles away. She was dug out and then carried by
helicopter to the hospital. Doctors expect Perez to make a full recovery,
at least physically.
   Her husband and an 8-year-old son are missing, and she assumes they are
dead. The number of bodies found in the Dominican Republic stands at about
465, though others are missing and officials don't have a full count.
   Perez says her two daughters, ages 18 and 12, keep asking her what they
are going to do.
   "I don't know what we'll do because we don't have a house to live in,"
said Perez, who along with her husband sold rice and beans at a biweekly
market in Jimani that attracts hundreds of vendors from both sides of the
border.
   About 30 survivors were brought to the Barahona hospital, the largest in
the country's western region, officials said. About 200 injured were
brought to other hospitals across the nation of 8.8 million.
   Some of the injured are struggling to afford treatment. Though public
hospitals are free, they are understaffed and often don't have the money to
buy basic supplies.
   Armando Ruiz, 80, crushed his right hip when he stepped into a
water-filled hole while searching for a granddaughter last Monday. He was
stuck there until rescuers found him about 12 hours later.
   On Sunday, he was laying naked in the hospital with a soft cast covering
his hip and leg. He said his granddaughter eventually turned up, but he
lost a daughter and grandson. And now he can't leave the hospital until
relatives can come up with 300 Dominican pesos $6 to buy him a hard cast.
   "I have nothing, no house, nothing," said Ruiz, waving his arms and
wincing as he spoke. "And I have no money to pay."