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Catastrophe Report 5
February 21 - July 21, 2004 |
Flood - Haiti and the Dominican Republic
| Territory: |
|
Haiti and the Dominican Republic |
| Region: |
|
Southern part of the island of Hispaniola
including the Dominican Republic provinces of Independencia
(including the town on Jimani), Elias Piña, Duarte, and
Sanchez Ramirez. In Haiti, the South, West and South-East departments,
including the town of Mapou, were severely affected. |
| Date: |
|
24 – 25 May 2004 |
| Event: |
|
Flood |
| Impact: |
|
As of mid-July, the death toll is around 2,000
with hundreds more still missing and presumed dead. In the town
of Jimani alone, 393 lives have been lost and 274 people are
still missing. More than 25,000 people have been made homeless,
with over 3,000 homes destroyed by floods and landslides and
many more damaged. The impact of the flooding was greatly exacerbated
by extensive deforestation in the region and by the growth of
settlements in flood plains and at the base of steep slopes.
Economic loss figures are not yet available but are expected
to be significant, proportional to the GDPs of the two countries |
| Summary: |
|
A low pressure system originating in Central
America, and tracking across the central Caribbean, brought
torrential rains to the island of Hispaniola between May 18th
and 25th. Moist, low level southerly winds interacted with the
topography to intensify the rainfall in the mountainous Massif
de la Salle region that straddles both countries in the south
of the island. Here, rainfall over the period exceeded 500 mm,
with 250 mm falling in just 24 hours at the town of Jimani in
the Dominican Republic. The rains triggered the formation of
flash floods, landslides and mudflows, and caused a number of
river systems to overflow on the north and south flanks of the
massif. The worst flooding occurred on May 24th and 25th when
the Solie River burst its banks. |
| Data sources: |
|
NASA Earth Observatory
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Study/Haiti2004/
ReliefWeb
http://www.reliefweb.int/w/rwb.nsf/vLND
|
| Additional sources:
|
|
Dartmouth Flood Obervatory
http://www.dartmouth.edu/~floods/2004075.html
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