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Las Tejerías (Venezuela) (AFP) – A tank of the Venezuelan Armed Forces sweeps trees and mountains of earth in its path: it clears one of the many roads blocked by the alluvium that devastated Las Tejerías, Venezuela, as a threat of rain this Thursday, October 13, puts pressure on the tasks in area.
The National Guard closed access to this mountainous town to accelerate “cleaning work because there is a forecast of rain,” while the search for more than 50 disappeared continues. Officially, the authorities have confirmed 43 fatalities.
“It has been cloudy. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday there were no precipitations, today it dawned with some cloudiness but we do not rule out rain towards the afternoon,” Angel Custodio, general manager of the Institute of Meteorology, Inameh, told AFP.
Venezuela is in the rainy season, but this year has been particularly rainy due to the La Niña phenomenon, which extended the season, as well as the troughs, storms and hurricanes, in addition to climate change.
“Question of seconds”
On Saturday, when the flood broke out in Las Tejerías, it rained the equivalent of a month in eight hours, according to the authorities.
“That was in a matter of seconds,” recalled Jesús Chávez, a 32-year-old survivor. “We managed to jump from roof to roof and people began to shout: ‘Help! Help!’… a child first, I passed him a tube, but he couldn’t get out because the current was too strong. He took it away” .
He was able to rescue six people, including a woman “who lost her two babies, one a month old.”
With the support of trained dogs and drones, thousands of firefighters, soldiers and Civil Protection, with mud on their knees or waists, keep searching among tree branches, pieces of concrete and stones, guided by inhabitants who, without any hope that their relatives have survived, they just want to recover the bodies to bury them.
The authorities cleaned the main avenues of the town and restored electricity, water and telecommunications services.
However, much remains to be done. There are still inaccessible places.
From helicopters, soldiers dropped food boxes with small parachutes on Wednesday to serve isolated areas.
“The arms of the Republic at the service of the people, clearing roads in Las Tejerías,” wrote Domingo Hernández Lares, head of the Strategic Operational Command of the Armed Forces, on Twitter, along with a video of the olive green minesweeper tank clearing the road.
The Venezuelan government has set up shelters and announced that it will relocate families to social housing complexes in other states.
Waiting for a UN visit
A United Nations commission plans to visit Las Tejerías this Friday with humanitarian aid, a source from the organization told AFP. The inputs that will be delivered are still being coordinated with the health authorities.
“We had a meeting with representatives of the United Nations, from the entire system, who are already organizing to enter in a coordinated manner,” said Vice President Delcy Rodríguez, who heads the government team dealing with the emergency, on Wednesday.
The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) reported in a statement that it donated “drugs and healing material for 5,000 people” to the Ministry of Health.
“In this way, the urgent needs of people with diabetes and hypertension and those suffering from skin and lung conditions can be met,” he said. “10,000 water purification tablets were donated, each with the capacity to make 10 liters of water drinkable,” added the institution.
A PAHO commission had already visited the disaster area on Sunday, the day after the landslide, according to the text.
