Cuban Government: Gustav and Ike Damage ‘Worst Ever’
Travel Blog • Jim Benning • 09.16.08 | 5:29 PM ET
Somehow, amid the din of media reports about Galveston, lipstick on pigs and the U.S. financial mess, I missed this. The Cuban government has declared that the damage caused by hurricanes Gustav and Ike was “the worst ever” in the country’s history. Given that Cuba has been blasted by countless hurricanes over the years, the toll has to be massive. According to the BBC’s report, some 200,000 people lost their homes as a result of the storms.
Cuba’s state-controlled Granma newspaper reports:
Every province was affected. The final figures have not yet been determined, given that these could increase due to the combined effects of heavy rainfall and the passing of the first few days. However, the majority of the effects were directly related to those places hit hardest by the worst of the rainfall and winds, in addition to flooding and coastal deluges before, during and after: Pinar del Río and the Isle of Youth, particularly by Gustav (with its Category 4), and Holguín, Las Tunas and Camagüey by Ike (Category 3).
Fortunately, the same article declares, “We will work more united than ever, always remembering that ‘our duty is to overcome!’”
How did travelers (whose duty should also be to overcome) fare?
In the U.K., the storms led to reports of “holiday horror.”
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Jim Benning is the editor and co-founder of World Hum.
