Hurricane Eta just devastated Central America. How are countries preparing for Hurricane Iota?

This year’s unprecedented hurricane season will land a deadly one-two punch to Central America: Thirteen days after the extremely dangerous Category 4 Hurricane Eta crashed into Nicaragua and battered Honduras, both countries prepare to face Iota — the second Category 5 hurricane on record to ever occur in the Atlantic in November.

Born last Friday in the Central Caribbean Sea and forecast to arrive at the Nicaraguan northern coast by Monday night, Iota will likely bring sustained winds of 160 mph, life-threatening storm surge as much as 15 to 20 feet above normal tide levels and torrential rainfall to the region.

The major hurricane will likely weaken rapidly over the mountainous terrain after landfall, dissipating to a tropical storm over Honduras and then to a tropical depression over El Salvador and Guatemala. Belize, Costa Rica and Panama will still receive heavy rains as well.

Because Eta already saturated the ground with water, left millions of people homeless and destroyed obstacles like trees and river boulders that would normally lessen the storm’s impact, Iota’s effect could be even worse than predicted.

“This is as bad as it gets,” said Dennis Feltgen, a meteorologist and spokesman for the National Hurricane Center. “I don’t think there’s anything on record where Honduras and Nicaragua end up getting hit with two hurricanes in two weeks. You’re looking at absolute catastrophic damage.”

Record-breaking Iota became the Category 5 hurricane to develop in the Atlantic basin the latest in the year — November 16 — in any hurricane season on record since 1851. The other Category 5 took place earlier in the month of November and smacked the Caribbean in 1932, Feltgen said.

The NHC posted hurricane watches and warnings, as well as tropical storm warnings, for the northern coasts of Nicaragua and Honduras.

‘Every man for himself’ in Honduras

After harsh criticism about governmental incompetence and lack of emergency management with Eta, Honduran authorities have tried to better prepare for Iota. The country was the hardest hit in the region during Eta.

The Honduran Secretary of State, Hector Ayala, suspended all operations for public employees for Tuesday and Wednesday. He advised the private sector to follow suit.

The public entity leading the preparation efforts, the Permanent Contingency Commission extended the Nov. 4 red alert emergency for all of the country indefinitely. It also ordered all local municipalities to evacuate anyone in areas at risk for flooding or landslides in 10 of Honduras’ 18 departments.

Various government agencies such as the National Police, firefighter stations and the military have partially helped transport people to the 543 open shelters nationwide. About 180,000 have been evacuated so far, and about 57,000 are currently staying in shelters, according to COPECO.

Despite the mandatory orders, people still remain in harm’s way. In the boulevard that separates San Pedro Sula and La Lima, some people left homeless after Eta have created makeshift tents on the sidewalks and the median. Others have flooded into gasoline stations, looking for refuge.

Some Hondurans, especially in rural areas like the tropical rain forest of La Mosquitia, lack the means to pay for scarce gasoline to move to cities, so they opt to find higher ground instead if time allows. Others refuse to leave behind their cattle, horses and other farm animals to fend for themselves.

Closer to urban areas, some people fear looters will break into their properties if they’re not there to safeguard. Others dread going to crowded places where they’ll become more vulnerable to COVID-19.

Marlon Escoto, the delegate for climate change in Honduras, pointed to lack of education and resources in the underdeveloped country.

“If an evacuation is ordered in a city in Florida, everyone is out in a few hours,” he said. “But in Honduras we lack the infrastructure locally to inform people about the danger first of all, and then to get them to safety.”

Escoto also said that issue is exacerbated by a problematic highly centralized government that relies on one or two people providing direction from Tegucigalpa, the capital city. Chaos breeds in local municipalities, which are incapable of reacting autonomously.

“The phrase ‘every man for himself’ fits very well,” Escoto said.

Indigenous, mestizo populations mainly at risk in Nicaragua

In a press conference Sunday, Guillermo González, the head of the Nicaraguan National System for the Prevention, Mitigation and Attention of Disasters, said he activated preparation and relief efforts nationwide, particularly in the north of the country, such as in the municipalities that make up the Triangulo Minero, and the departments of Jinotega and Nueva Segovia.

González said people received information to develop family and community emergency plans through house-to-house visits. He added evacuations were already occurring across the North Caribbean Coast Autonomous Region (RACCN in Spanish), which spans northeastern Nicaragua and hugs the Atlantic coast. Much of its population is indigenous and mestizo.

Hurricane Eta hit the RACCN hard last week. The storm left “at least five” indigenous communities “completely destroyed”, according to local outlet Confidencial. The Nicaraguan Institute for Territorial Studies warned the northeast portions of RACCN are slated to receive the highest accumulation of rain in the Central American nation.

González said the government is preparing shelters with basic supplies. Humanitarian aid is being mobilized from Managua to regions vulnerable to Iota’s effects. Rescue and medical brigades are also being readied for dispatch, and shipping has been suspended.

But local leaders have said that that one shelter in Puerto Cabezas, the capital of RACCN, housing people from a Miskito community, did not have the supplies they needed for everyone, according to radio station Onda Local. People from local surrounding communities continued to evacuate, the station reported, as the threat of Iota loomed closer.

Nancy Elizabeth Henriquez is a Miskito community leader who lives in Puerto Cabezas. Her son is helping people evacuate and simultaneously documenting the storm’s arrival through videos he sends to his mother over Whatsapp. She said that while some people are opting to stay in government shelters, many are choosing to stay with family and friends instead.

Henriquez prepared for the storm by buying food and water and sheltering at home in the company of neighbors.

“We are desperate, very desperate, and we are worried,” Henriquez told el Nuevo Herald about the city’s residents, detailing how they had also experienced fierce Category 5 Hurricane Félix in 2007, which is reported to have killed at least 130 people across Nicaragua and Honduras.

She estimated that 60% of Puerto Cabezas’ neighborhoods were devastated after Eta, with some surrounding communities almost completely wiped out post-storm.

“We don’t know how we will end up” after Iota, she said.