UNiFEED Story: HAITI / GUSTAV (1.45), Hurricane Gustav gains force as it heads for impoverished Haiti. The storm was upgraded to a Category 1 hurricane just miles off the country's southern coast. MINUSTAH

26 August 2008

HAITI / GUSTAV (1.45)

Hurricane Gustav gains force as it heads for impoverished Haiti. The storm was upgraded to a Category 1 hurricane just miles off the country's southern coast. MINUSTAH

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STORY: HAITI/ GUSTAV
SOURCE: MINUSTAH
TRT: 1.45
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / NATS

DATELINE 26 AUGUST 2008, PORT-AU-PRINCE, HAITI

SHOTLIST:

1. Wide shot, Port-au-Prince bay, some trees in wind
2. Med shot, palm tree blowing
3. Med shot, trees blowing
4. Wide shot, street vendors hiding under an umbrella
5. Wide shot, woman with bag on her head
6. Wide shot, woman walking in fog up a dirt road
7. SOUNDBITE (English) Erdem Ergin, Senior Technical Consultant, UNDP National Disaster Management System:
"The likely scenarios are flooding, swollen rivers; it has been raining a lot over the past two weeks. And the soil is already saturated with water, so we can have flash floods, we can have mud slides, and we can have damage on crops because of flooding too."
8. Pan left, people walking in the rain pan to a flash flood ravine
9. Wide shot, car splashing puddle on the road, no drainage
10. Wide shot, people walking up a road in slums
11. Pan right, slums precariously built on a hillside
12. Wide shot, slum shacks
13. Wide shot, people on rainy street
14. Med shot, girls cowering from the rain

STORYLINE:

Haiti's capital Port-au-Prince is bracing itself as Hurricane Gustav was upgraded to a Category 1 hurricane, just miles off Haiti's southern coast, with top sustained winds of 90 mph (150 kph) and became a direct threat to the island nation.

SOUNDBITE (English) Erdem Ergin, Senior Technical Consultant, UNDP National Disaster Management System:
"The likely scenarios are flooding, swollen rivers; it has been raining a lot over the past two weeks. And the soil is already saturated with water, so we can have flash floods, we can have mud slides, and we can have damage on crops because of flooding too."

Rain began falling in the dilapidated capital at noon local time, and is expected to continue for the next twelve hours. Local aid workers are helping the population prepare for a disaster.

Streets around the capital were deserted as merchants closed their shops and ordinary citizens sought refuge from rains at the leading edge of the storm which soaked the city's streets.

Gustav is expected to produce 38 cm of rain in some areas and could provoke major flooding in the capital which is mostly without a drainage system.

Flash floods and mudslides can be deadly for the hundreds of thousands of people living in precariously built slums on mountainsides.

In 2004, days of slow, steady rain from Tropical Storm Jeanne inundated the Haitian city of Gonaives, killing thousands. The hurricane is just the latest challenge for the troubled island nation still struggling to right itself after food riots in April.

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Breadcrumb Trail

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HAITI / GUSTAV (1.45)

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