A house on the coast of Honduras is flooded as Hurricane Mitch whirls through the western Caribbean. (AP)

By Serge F. Kovaleski
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, October 29, 1998; Page A37

PUERTO CORTES, Honduras, Oct. 28 – Hovering off the northern coast of Honduras, Hurricane Mitch today battered this Central American country's oceanside towns and outer islands with punishing winds and drenching rains, causing at least a score more deaths, wrecking homes and businesses and forcing frantic evacuations here and in neighboring Belize and Guatemala.

Throughout the day, the storm barely moved, churning in place about 25 miles north of the Honduran coast, according to the U.S. National Hurricane Center. The storm's contact with land reduced its earlier punch, with top sustained winds this evening recorded at 105 mph, in comparison to the 180 mph gales spinning from its center two days ago.

Late this afternoon, Mitch was drifting westward very slowly, but forecasters said they could not accurately predict when or where it will make landfall because of its sluggish pace. The Caribbean coastlines of Honduras, Guatemala and Belize and the eastern edge of the Yucatan Peninsula north to Mexico's luxury resort of Cancun remained under a hurricane watch.

Despite its ebbing strength, the storm still packed a highly destructive punch, dumping up to 20 inches of rain along large stretches of northern Honduras and triggering widespread flooding. At least 23 people have died in Honduras as a result of the storm, authorities said, and two police officers are believed missing. More than 40,000 people have been forced to seek refuge in packed shelters that are short of food, water, beds and blankets.

In Nicaragua, south of Honduras, the Red Cross said eight people had died in flooding that civil defense authorities reported had isolated as many as 10 towns and stranded 15,000 people.

During a tour of coastal areas in northwestern Honduras today, reporters saw throngs of people wading through deep floodwaters with their belongings – everything from large pieces of furniture to picture frames – toward nearby shelters. Some 2,000 people were evacuated from the coastal city of La Ceiba, which was under a foot of water and strewn with downed trees and debris from wrecked homes.

Dozens of bridges throughout Honduras were washed away, and more than four dozen rivers were reported to have spilled over their banks. Officials estimate that at least 30,000 acres of key crops, such as corn, beans and rice, have been destroyed since Mitch's outer bands started lashing Honduras two days ago.

Farther north and west, in Belize, driving rain, strong winds and high waves lashed southern areas, cutting electricity, telephone and water service and causing high tides and river flooding that isolated many small, low-lying communities, according to radio reports. News services reported that most of the 75,000 residents of Belize City – which was devastated by a hurricane in 1961 – had abandoned their homes and fled inland to higher ground.

Just across the border in Chetumal, the capital of Mexico's southern state of Quintana Roo, the airport and seaport were closed, streets were deserted, and houses and businesses in the normally bustling, duty-free haven were boarded-up.

In Cancun, where giant waves and high winds continued to pound Mexico's top tourist resort, 35,500 tourists have fled in the past three days, according to Alejandro Compean, manager of the Cancun Convention and Visitors Bureau. The airport remained jammed today with cranky tourists who decided to cut their vacations short, then were forced to jockey for sparse seats on overbooked flights.

So far, Honduras's Bay Islands, which are popular resort destinations for American scuba divers and beachgoers, have borne the brunt of Mitch's fury. Radio reports said that there have been five deaths on the island of Guanaja and that nearly all electricity and phone service on the islands have been knocked out. Officials said there has been no running water there for the last two days.

Here in Puerto Cortes, a coastal city in the northwestern corner of Honduras, about 30 miles from the Guatemalan border, flood water is knee-deep in some neighborhoods, large numbers of brittle wooden homes near the beach have been reduced to piles of water-soaked debris, and billboards have been crumpled into scrap metal. Roads have been blocked by fallen trees, large palm fronds and rock slides.

"Everything in my life was washed away. Now I will have to fight with nothing in my name to get up again and go on with my life," said Rosa Aguiluz, 47, whose small home on the beach was swallowed by a towering tidal surge Tuesday night. "God be with me."

Many of her neighbors suffered the same fate, including Santas Maradiga, 26, whose wooden house, where he lived with 17 other relatives, was also leveled by fierce ocean waves. "I do not know how we will rebuild our lives. We are very poor and need help from someone because we have nothing left," Maradiga said.

Along a flooded, muddy road in Puerto Cortes, Elesterio Hernandez, 42, his wife and eight children, endured the driving rains and powerful winds this afternoon to walk several miles back to their shack from a school shelter to eat what little food they had left at home.

"We had to return to feed the kids. They have not eaten in two days, and they are starving," Hernandez said. "The shelter has no food, no nothing. It is just a roof. It is horrible."

Correspondents Molly Moore in Cancun and John Ward Anderson in Belize and Chetumal, Mexico, also contributed to this report.