The Big Storm Down South
Hurricane John
What we needed right after the storm was a visit by some small town Kansas Rotary Club members. They would have recognized quickly what it took us
days, weeks to figure out; Hurricane John was a category two storm with moderate sustained winds but was moving along with a cadre of twisters held in
by a tight and organized eye-wall. The whirling tornados sprang up, did their deadly dances, melded back into the maelstrom; a dynamic of many well
organized typhoons and hurricanes. While the weathermen were telling us to prepare for 115 mile an hour winds, we would later see the incredible
wreckage caused by winds surpassing 275 miles per hour in the twisters.
The spooky calm of the storm’s eye passing over us was short, unholy. Sunday, two days after the storm, there was another kind of silence. It was
the soothing stillness falling on spent and tested survivors that marked the beginning of healing; a time of replenishment and perhaps the gift
salvation offers with such unspoken grace. A remarkable quietude, it was a hush that gently opened the door where succor and solace dwell.
No two storms are alike; this one was a cleaner. In every village street mountains of power and telephone poles, fallen trees and storm debris stood
as barricades against the advances of fleets of utility trucks and heavy equipment, villagers with ropes and shovels. When the streets were ready for
vehicles, debris removal really ramped up – special crews with loaders and trucks began to take all the refuse to the dump. The villagers all took
advantage of the opportunity to rid their lots of rubbish, junk that had cluttered their lots for years.
Los Cabos is such an important area to Mexico’s thriving tourist business the Mexican government arranged for 600 temporary power company employees to
be quickly transported to the Los Cabos airport as soon as planes could land there. When they discovered the major damage was well north of Los
Cabos, in the East Cape area, it meant a virtual army of pole setters and linesmen were available to each little hard hit pueblo. I watched in awe as
the CFE people performed miracles while they laughed and roughhoused like kids on spring break. Risking death or injury aloft they seemed to me to be
part Mexican circus roustabouts, part daredevil clowns in tan shirts, pants, bright yellow hardhats. Later groups of special Telmex emergency workers
set new poles with only shovels and hands – the only equipment I saw was the big stake truck that carried the strong, wiry youngsters from one fallen
pole to the next.
Even with all that organization, all those heroics, most of our phone lines were still down 30 days after the storm so we had little communication
with the outside world. Two weeks after the storm, news traveled through the pueblo that yet another storm, Lane, was following Hurricane John’s
track and was due to make landfall near us in less than 24 hours. The next morning, while the village was boarding up their homes again and making
plans to hold the traditional Independence celebration at city hall that evening, some outsider slammed Perdition’s gaping door when he informed us
Hurricane Lane had veered toward the Mexican mainland and would not pose a threat to us. On September 15 not a shot was fired, not one shout was
heard in our little town. Hurricane Lane made landfall the next morning breaking somebody else’s things in Sinaloa.
We all said “¿Que lastima?” but we really meant “Gracias Dios.” After all, we are proud and resilient but we are human.
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