Hurricane to hit Bahamas

Saint-Marc (Haiti), Sept. 3: A day after sending Haitian families scrambling onto rooftops to avoid flooding, Tropical Storm Hanna was meandering off the country’s northern coast on Wednesday, dumping heavy rain on much of Hispaniola.

But Hanna was expected to begin moving over the Bahamas later in the day.

A day earlier, Hanna added to the misery in Haiti, a country still recovering from drenchings by Hurricane Gustav and Tropical Storm Fay in the past two weeks.

In all, floods and mudslides from the three storms have killed more than 100 people as Haiti’s deforested hills melted away in torrential rains. Families screamed for help from rooftops on Tuesday in a flooded city as rescue convoys tried in vain to reach them.

By Tuesday night, Hanna claimed 21 lives in Haiti, including 12 dead in the state containing the cut-off city of Gonaives, said Marie Alta Jean-Baptiste of the country’s civil protection office in Port-au-Prince, the capital. Iris Norsil, 20, managed to flee Gonaives on Haiti’s western shore and said people there were isolated by muddy floodwaters as evening fell, seeking refuge on rooftops as wind gusts drove horizontal sheets of rain. "They are screaming for help," Norsil said as a UN aid convoy tried unsuccessfully to drive into Gonaives, now surrounded by a virtual lake of floodwaters. A team of AP journalists accompanied the convoy. Another convoy carrying Prime Minister Michele Pierre-Louis had to abandon efforts at getting into Gonaives when one of the cars was nearly swept away, said Julian Frantz, a Haitian police officer who was providing security.

Floodwaters rose rapidly outside Gonaives, where Norsil and scores of other residents who abandoned the low-lying city shivered violently in soaked clothing, nervously eyeing the rushing, debris-clogged waters.

"The situation is as bad as it can be," said Vadre Louis, a UN official in Gonaives. "The wind is ripping up trees. Houses are flooded with water. Cars can’t drive on the street. You can’t rescue anyone, wherever they may be." Those who could move clutched mattresses, chairs and other belongings as they slogged through waist-high floodwaters.

—AP