The National System for the Prevention, Mitigation and Response to Natural Disasters (Sinapred), through official media, reported that the heavy rains that have been recorded since Monday, September 23, have caused serious damage in at least nine municipalities in Nicaragua.
The municipalities most affected by the rains, according to the Sinapred report, so far are: Jalapa, Murra, Juigalpa, Potosí, San Francisco del Norte, Villa El Carmen, El Crucero, San Rafael del Sur and La Paz Centro.
The report details that so far in the country a total of “181 homes have been temporarily flooded, eight houses destroyed, five vehicles swept away by the currents, one bridge collapsed and trees fallen” have been recorded.
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Sinapred, together with the support of members of the Municipal Committee for Disaster Prevention and Response (Comupred), also evacuated 540 people.
Impacts by municipalities
In the municipality of Jalapa, in the El Porvenir community, six houses were registered as temporarily flooded; in Murra, in the Juan Gregorio Colindres and Randolfo Barahona neighborhoods, 15 houses were registered as flooded and five destroyed; in Jalapa, 78 houses were registered as flooded in the Héctor Ugarte, Diriangén and Paiwas neighborhoods; in Potosí, 50 houses were registered as flooded, especially in the Barraza community, after the Ochomogo River rose; and in La Paz Centro, 32 houses were registered as flooded and three destroyed.
Other damages were also documented, such as the collapse of the Ubuto bridge, which connects San Francisco Norte and Cinco Pinos, in San Francisco Norte, Chinandega; the fall of a guanacaste tree at kilometer 50.5 of the California community, in Villa El Carmen, Managua; the fall of another tree in the community of Monte Fresco, El Crucero; and the flooding of the Masachapa River, in San Rafael del Sur, where several families living on the banks of that tributary had to evacuate to take shelter.
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According to Sinapred, the vehicles that were swept away by the currents were: a public transport bus, owned by Raúl Rodríguez; a cargo transport truck, owned by Elmer Leonel Siles Peralta; two pickup trucks, owned by Leonel Siles Herrera and Pedro Tijerino, respectively, and a motorcycle, owned by Rommel López.
The rains that have been recorded in the country, in addition to the damage documented by Sinapred, have also caused rivers to rise, which have prevented many families from accessing health services, education or their workplaces.
In the Pedernal region, located in the municipality of La Conquista, in the department of Carazo, according to local media reports, an eight-year-old boy, identified by the initials FJZO, died after presenting fever and not being able to go to a hospital, since the flooding of the El Encierro River, located in that municipality, left the families of that region cut off from communication.
More rain is forecast for the next few hours
In its meteorological report for Wednesday, September 25, the Natural Phenomena Observatory (Ofena) predicted more rain for the coming hours, especially in the Pacific and western Nicaragua.
He explained that although Tropical Storm Helene, which formed on September 24 in the Gulf of Honduras, will become a Category 1 cyclone this afternoon, it will continue its path toward the Gulf of Mexico and will not affect Nicaragua.
“The Central American Gyre is degrading as Helene advances towards the Gulf of Mexico and this will reduce the intensity of heavy rains, but we will maintain some cloudy conditions that will affect from the Pacific to the interior of the territory as part of the low pressure systems that will be influencing from the west coast to the interior of our territory,” said agrometeorologist Agustín Moreira, director of Ofena.
Moreira specified that from midday on Wednesday, September 25, in the northwest of Nicaragua there will be “quite intense rainfall and for the rest of the territory, the possibility of precipitation will be degraded. Meanwhile, from El Cuá towards Rosita and part of Waspán, some light rain or showers may occur. And at 5 in the afternoon we will only have some cloudy weather, drizzle and light and isolated showers, which may occur always from the Pacific area towards the interior of the territory.”
