Hurricane Eta in Honduras

I am no novice to hurricanes. I have been through several different storms. The most memorable have been Hurricane Gilbert in 1988 while in Cancun and Hurricane Mitch in 1998. Hurricane Eta in Honduras will join the short list of memorable storms. To be honest, Nicaragua took the brunt of Hurricane Eta. It made landfall south of  Puerto Cabezas, on the north Caribbean Coast of that country.  Since I live in La Ceiba, on the Caribbean Coast of Honduras, it was a blessing to note that it was not going impact us a dangerous storm.

However, Hurricane Eta in Honduras did live up to the forecasts that the National Hurricane Center offered us. Up to 35 inches of rain in some parts of Honduras. Honduras is not a large country, and the storm was huge. As Hurricane Eta entered Nicaragua and slammed into the mountains of Northern Nicaragua, it lost its punch. The storm entered Honduras on November 4 as a tropical depression, in the vicinity of the city of Danli. From there it headed south of Tegucigalpa. It was expected to be out over the Caribbean Sea sometime, Friday November 6^th.

As I sit writing this post, I am enjoying the first sunny day of the week. The furious sound of water rushing down the Cangrejal River is testimony to the copious amounts of rain that have fallen. We have been without power for at least 56 hours. Our cellular phone coverage and internet service has been down for 30 hours. A section of the road into town has washed away. Therefore, I have had limited contact with the outside world. I apologize for the untimely update of this post!

I can report that all the hotels in the Cangrejal River have had no damage and are ready to receive guests when the road reopens. This is our first goal, getting the road open. The second one will be to get the power back up. But this will not happen until the road is back. I am hopeful that this will happen shortly, as the river is now getting lower and will allow for maintenance on the road. Experience has been that the road can be open within 24 hours once the machinery is there.

Today I will drive as far as I can, walk across the section that was damaged and hope to get some sort of transportation into town to make some important calls. I will also make sure I get some fuel for our power plant, as I expect that we will be without power for another 2 or 3 days. I understand that as a result of Hurricane Eta in Honduras, many remote communities without communication. So far, it appears that the loss of life has been limited, but I am afraid that damage to infrastructure is high.