Weather and tragedy

Guatemala is the 4th country in the world, with the greatest risk of climate change. That is seen in lots of different ways, but the increase of extreme weather patterns is certainly one way I which I have seen changes - even in the time that I have lived here.

A month ago, a massive landslide buried over 100 homes, and their inhabitants, after weeks of heavy rain had saturated and weakened the hillside, at the base of which they were situated. A huge rescue operation began, but it uickly turned into a search for remains, rather than for survivors. Around 200 bodies have been recovered, but a similar number of people are still unaccounted for. It has been a huge tragedy here in Guatemala. The area was known to be at high risk of landslides, but the local government had continued to sell land rights in the area. Hard questions have been raised, but not quite answered.

But land has already been identified, where new houses will be built for those who have lost everything, and work actually started last week.