Cover Story
Chata'an's Wrath
Chuuk and Guam are hit by deadly Typhoon Chata'an.
 |
|
|
Chata‘an was only a tropical storm on July 2 when it blew through Chuuk lagoon on its way to Guam. By the time it reached Guam, 620 miles northwest of Chuuk, its winds had reached speeds that promoted the storm to full typhoon status. Guam, whose water and power service are iffy at the best of times, suffered dramatic losses to its utilities infrastructure. But there was no loss of life on Guam. Chuuk, one of the four states in the Federated States of Micronesia, was not so fortunate, however. As we go to press, the island state is mourning 47 lives lost to Chata‘an.
- ADVERTISEMENT -
Why such tragic losses? Most people picture Micronesian islands as flat atolls, without the mountains or streams that come to mind when we think of places like Tahiti or Hawai‘i. The islands inside Chuuk’s huge lagoon are volcanic, and this is where the lethal damage was done.
Although the tropical storm winds caused the same kind of damage as on Guam, it was the unrelenting rain that turned the storm lethal for Chuuk. The storm soaked hillsides to the saturation point and, as the slopes liquefied, more than 30 landslides over a period of several hours swept away or buried people and their dwellings. Early reports said more than 1,000 homes were destroyed or damaged. As relief efforts continue, the number looks to be closer to several hundred destroyed homes. Most of the deaths and home losses were on the island of Tonoa.
There were problems with response.
The national government of FSM is headquartered in Pohnpei and, although President Leo Falcam happened to be in Chuuk at the time the storm hit, he was stuck there for three days before air service was restored. Although some news reports claimed the FSM government did not complete disaster paperwork properly, the real reason for delay, according to a source in the U.S. government, was that the Chuuk governor, Ansito Walter, insisted on flying around the islands of his jurisdiction to do damage assessment. Meanwhile the dead and injured were filling the Chuuk hospital in Weno, where there was no power or water, no adequate medical supplies, and the X-ray machine was not in working order even before the storm hit.
Guam, which is the major air hub servicing FSM, was having its own problems. Phone service was intermittent, but it was power and water service that were the real problems. Two weeks after Chata‘an hit Guam, only 45 percent of power customers had electricity restored. Potable water by tap was virtually nonexistent. Citizens were instructed to use bottled water for drinking and boiled water for other uses. Water tankers were dispatched to key locations.
On July 15, we talked by satellite phone to Josie Pritchard, a Federal Emergency Management Agency information officer, who was on Guam. She said her team was staying at the Marriott hotel, which had power only because it had its own generators. There was water available from the tap only between 6 and 8 p.m. “The hotel gives us two bottles of water every day for drinking,” she said. Her FEMA team had set up emergency shelters on Guam using schools and public buildings. The FEMA team was also coordinating the relief efforts for Chuuk. “The biggest needs on Chuuk right now,” Pritchard told us, “are medical supplies and drinking water.”
FEMA eligibility is an important issue in the American affiliated governments in Micronesia. Any U.S. state or territory can request FEMA assistance in times of disaster, but the status of the so-called “freely-associated” states is more ambiguous and FEMA eligibility has always been an important issue in Compact of Free Association negotiations. According to Bill Carwile, a national FEMA coordinating officer who was also on Guam, “The Republic of the Marshall Islands and FSM both have FEMA eligibility in their Compact agreements. Palau accepted a one-time, lump-sum payment for emergency response at the time of their original agreement.” Guam and Saipan, FSM and RMI are eligible for FEMA services. So is American Sämoa.
Describing the logistics of the relief effort to Chuuk, Carwile says, “We’ve got a full federal team on Chuuk now, including people from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Army Corps of Engineers, Army physicians from Tripler Hospital in Honolulu and the U.S. Forest Service. We had preexisting warehouses of supplies in Hawai‘i and Guam.”
As Pacific Magazine went to press, relief supplies such as tarps, shovels, medical supplies, food and water were being loaded on pallets at Hickam AFB in Honolulu. Huge military C-5 cargo planes fly the supplies to Guam’s Andersen Air Force Base. “Then we have to break down what’s going to Chuuk,” Carwile says, “and put it on smaller C-130 airplanes, which can land on the shorter runway at Weno.” Flights have to be timed so that the Weno airport is not overwhelmed.
The governments of both Chuuk and Guam were in deep financial trouble even before Chata‘an hit. Guam’s post-September 11 drop in tourism had already damaged its economy severely.
People in the Pacific often feel abandoned when disasters such as Chata‘an happen. Media in metropolitan areas such as Auckland or Honolulu mention the events briefly, then move on to other stories. But people are still pitching in. Danny Rescue, the FSM senior consul in Honolulu, has had meetings with the Chuukese community there. “We are asking community leaders for their help; we are asking other Micronesians for their help,” he says.
The Ayuda Foundation, a medical nonprofit organization in Guam, and one of the first organizations to respond, sent physicians and medical supplies to Chuuk. The American Red Cross chapter in Saipan collected donations for Chuuk, even though technically FSM is not covered under the American Red Cross. The Salvation Army in Honolulu sent a team to Chuuk. All of this assistance is passing through Guam, while the territory itself tries to work on post-storm problems such as debris disposal, damage to roads and bridges and repair of water and power infrastructures. FEMA administrator Carwile sums it up: “The people of the Pacific are really pulling together. The people of Guam have been very generous to Chuuk even in their own time of need.”
