Isaiah Beck, a carpenter, was trying to reach his storm-battered house in the New River community in St. Elizabeth parish, on Jamaica’s storm-battered southwestern coast. His home was on the other side of a large pool of chest-high water.
But he thought better of it when he saw the dead livestock.
“There is a dead cow and hog; the water is starting to get infested,” he said. “The water is coming from all sides.”
Three days after Hurricane Melissa roared across Jamaica, many people in communities stricken by the powerful storm find themselves trapped by floodwaters that keep rising, apparently because of a drainage system that had become blocked.
The hurricane, one of the strongest ever recorded in the Atlantic Ocean, ripped through several island nations, leaving behind death and widespread destruction.
At least 19 people were killed in Jamaica, and at least 30, including children, in Haiti, officials said. Jamaican officials said they expected the death toll to climb as the authorities reached and searched through the worst hit areas.
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