23254: (Chamberlain) Haiti-Jeanne (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

   By AMY BRACKEN

   GONAIVES, Sept 23 (AP) -- Workers dug new mass graves for corpses that
still littered this flood-ravaged city Thursday as the death toll from
Tropical Storm Jeanne rose to more than 1,070 and residents grew
increasingly agitated from a lack of food and drinkable water.
   Health workers feared an epidemic from the unburied bodies, raw sewage
in drinking water and infections from injuries. About 250,000 were left
homeless in Haiti's northwest province, which includes the port of
Gonaives, from the weekend storm.
   Officials say the death toll could reach 2,000, with more than 1,250
reported missing and presumed washed out to sea, buried in mud or floating
in houses still inaccessible to rescuers.
   Survivors who spent the night crammed into schools, churches and on
rooftops slogged through contaminated, ankle-deep mud in Gonaives, where
more bodies lay unclaimed in waterlogged fields. Residents held limes to
their noses against the stench of the bodies and overflowing latrines.
   "There are so many bodies, you smell them but you don't see them," said
farmer Louise Roland. She said her rice and corn field was under water so
she walked miles to town to try to get food.
   Aid workers feared that waterborne diseases could erupt.
   "It's a critical situation in terms of epidemics, because of the bodies
still in the streets, because people are drinking dirty water and scores
are getting injuries from debris -- huge cuts that are getting infected,"
said Francoise Gruloos, Haiti director for the U.N. Children's Fund.
   Martine Vice-Aimee, an 18-year-old mother of two whose home was
destroyed, said people already were falling ill.
   "People are getting sick from the water, they're walking in it, their
skin is getting itchy and rashes. The water they're drinking is giving them
stomach aches."
   Limited distribution by aid workers left most people still hungry and
thirsty.
   Gruloos said some residents were marooned on the roofs of homes
surrounded by water and mud, scared to climb down into the filth. People
defecated on sidewalks.
   The government's civil protection agency said more than 900 people have
been treated, most for cuts and gashes. But the main General Hospital was
out of commission, medical supplies were running out, and some aid trucks
couldn't reach Gonaives because part of the road was washed away.
   Trucks dumped up to 200 bodies into a mass grave at sunset Wednesday,
but hundreds more were piled up outside morgues without electricity,
awaiting burial.
   There was no funeral ceremony when the bodies were dumped into a
14-foot-deep hole at sunset Wednesday. Dozens of bystanders shrieked and
told officials to collect nearby unburied bodies.
   "We're demanding they come and take the bodies from our fields. Dogs are
eating them," said bystander Jean Lebrun.
   Only a couple dozen bodies have been identified, and nobody was taking
count at the Bois Marchand cemetery -- the only one in the city not under
water.
   "We can only drink the water people died in," the 35-year-old farmer
said, citing a lack of potable water six days after the storm's passage.
   Dieufort Deslorges, spokesman for the government's civil protection
agency, said the confirmed death toll rose to 1,072, with 1,013 bodies
recovered in Gonaives alone by Wednesday.
   Aid agencies have dry food stocked in Gonaives, but few have the means
to cook. Food for the Poor, based in Deerfield, Fla., said its truckloads
of relief were unable to reach the city Wednesday. Troops from the
Brazilian-led U.N. peacekeeping forcing were ferrying in some supplies by
helicopter.
   Peacekeepers fired into the air Wednesday to keep a crowd at bay as aid
workers handed out loaves of bread -- the first food in days for some.
   "The situation is not getting better because people have been without
food or water for three or four days," said Hans Havik, of the
International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.
   The federation appealed for $3.3 million to fund relief operations to
40,000 Haitian victims, and several nations were sending help.
   Forecasters said Jeanne -- now a 100 mph hurricane -- appeared set to do
a loop over the Atlantic and zero in on the northwest and central islands
of the Bahamas and then the southeast U.S. coast, with Florida firmly in
its sights.
   At 5 a.m. EDT, Jeanne was centered about 475 miles east of Great Abaco
Island in the Bahamas. It was moving west near 5 mph, a speed that would
bring it near Florida by Sunday.
   The Bahamian government posted a tropical storm watch for the central
islands, including Cat Islands, the Exumas, Long Island, Rum Cay and San
Salvador.
   Jeanne's rain-laden system proved deadly in Haiti, where more than 98
percent of the land is deforested and torrents of water and mudslides
smashed down denuded hills and into the city. Floodwater lines on buildings
went up to 10 feet high.
   Last week, Jeanne also killed seven people in Puerto Rico and at least
19 in Dominican Republic. The overall death toll for the Caribbean was at
least 1,098.
   The disaster follows devastating floods in May, along the
Haiti-Dominican Republic border, which left 1,191 dead and 1,484 missing in
Haiti and 395 dead and 274 missing on the Dominican side. The countries
share the island of Hispaniola.
   ------
   On the Net:
   National Hurricane Center: http://www.nhc.noaa.gov
   Weather Underground storm site: http://www.wunderground.com/tropical