Several people stand in front of a collapsed pedestrian bridge on Saturday, November 16, 2024 due to flooding caused by rains from Tropical Storm Sara in San Pedro Sula, Honduras (AP Photo/Moisés Castillo)
The tormenta tropical Sara parked on Honduras this Saturday, soaking the northern coast of the Central American nation, increasing the water level of the rivers and leaving several trapped people in their homes.
Continuous rains fell overnight and continued into Saturday morning in the city of San Pedro Sula, where the storm blocked access to an entire community when A bridge over a river collapsed. There is a possibility that Life-threatening flash floods and avalanches in the region over the weekend, according to the United States National Hurricane Center (NHC).
Sara made landfall Thursday night about 165 kilometers (105 miles) west-northwest of Cape Gracias a Dios, on the border between Honduras and Nicaragua. The NHC predicts that the storm will continue moving on Saturday and Sunday with a “somewhat faster movement towards the west-northwest” towards the Gulf of Honduras before making landfall in Belice.
Subsequently, Sara is expected to head northwest toward the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexicoalthough meteorologists indicated that it will probably not re-emerge in the Gulf of Mexico after crossing Yucatán.
A man throws an object while standing on a section of a destroyed bridge during the aftermath of Tropical Storm Sara in La Ceiba, Honduras, November 16, 2024 (REUTERS/Esau Ocampo)
People watched nervously as the conditions brought back memories of the disastrous November 2020 hurricane season, when two powerful storms hit the region, displacing hundreds of thousands of people and causing widespread damage.
Standing on the riverbank, Carlos Canelas, 48, acknowledged that many residents like his mother had ignored government warnings to evacuate the Flor de Cuba neighborhood in San Pedro Sula. By Saturday morning, the 77-year-old woman was cut off from the rest of the city because a bridge over a river had collapsed and was left home with her 35-year-old son with special needs. “That’s why I didn’t go to work, but I can do little or nothing,” he commented. “I can cross over and swim, but how do I get my mom out?”
However, the storm did not prevent a CONCACAF Nations League match from taking place on Friday in San Pedro Sula. Under heavy rain, Mexico lost 2-0 to Honduras.
In November 2020, Eta and Iota passed through Honduras after making landfall in Nicaragua as Category 4 hurricanes. Northern Honduras received the worst of the storms with torrential rains that caused flooding that displaced hundreds of thousands of people. Eta alone was responsible for up to 76 centimeters (30 inches) of rain along the northern coast.
A man stands next to damaged structures during the aftermath of Tropical Storm Sara in La Ceiba, Honduras, November 16, 2024 (REUTERS/Esau Ocampo)
The NHC said on Saturday that storm surge could raise water levels along the northern coast of Honduras to about 1 meter (3 feet) above normal.
“Near the coast, the surge will be accompanied by large and destructive waves,” according to the center. “A storm surge could raise water levels between 1 and 3 feet (30 and 90 centimeters) above ground level near and north of where the center of Sara crosses the coast of Belize.”
(With information from AP)
