Fidel Castro: Hurricane Hit Cuba Like an Atomic Bomb
Wednesday, September 17th, 2008
Hurricane Gustav hit western Cuba with winds of 150 miles per hour damaging or destroying 100,000 homes on Saturday before moving on to the coast of Louisiana. The disaster struck from Havana to the western city of Pinar del Rio on the main island. Fidel Castro said the Island of Youth, the country’s second biggest island was hit the worst. “Hurricane Gustav hit like a nuclear bomb that reminds me of the desolation I saw at Hiroshima,” exclaimed Castro.
This hurricane knocked out all but two of Cuba’s 16 bakeries that supply the bread for the people on the Isla de Juventud. Authorities are now struggling to feed its population of 86,000 on this adjoining island.
Hurricane Ike hit massively the following week with 120mph winds roaring from the eastern side of the country. Ike literally traveled across the entire nation before it wreaked havoc on Texas. Ike rattled Havana enough to collapse 16 buildings and damage 67 others in the capital city. Resident Maria Valdez said, “It sounded like Havana had been invaded by an army of ghosts,” referring to the howling winds that blew through the streets littering them with fallen trees, foliage and building debris. Almost 1.25 million people of the 11 million population fled for other shelters across the island.
According to Victor Ramirez, president of the National Institute of Housing, Ike damaged 200,000 homes as well as nearly 30,000 that were destroyed by the intense winds, torrential rain and high flooding. Reuters news agency reported the two hurricanes blasted Cuba damaging or destroying 320,000 homes in a country that already had a shortage of 500,000 homes.
In a poor neighborhood along the train tracks, the combined fury of Ike and Gustav left nearly two-thirds of the wooden homes without roofs or completely leveled. Olga Atiaga, a 53 year old housewife said, “The first one left me something, but this one left me nothing.” Gustav obliterated her roof and some walls. Then Ike blew away a mattress and smashed the kitchen sink. Both of these hurricanes also wiped out the electricity grid, toppled trees, leveled crops including sugar cane fields, and turned rivers into roaring torrents.