Hurricane Stan

Infobox Hurricane
Name=Hurricane Stan
Type=hurricane
Year=2005
Basin=Atl
Image location=Stan 04oct05.jpg


Formed=October 1, 2005
Dissipated=October 5, 2005
1-min winds=70
Pressure=977
Da

Inflated=2
Fatalities=80 direct, 1,540-2,000 indirect including non-tropical rains
Areas=Guatemala, El Salvador, southern and eastern Mexico, Nicaragua, Honduras and Costa Rica
Hurricane season=2005 Atlantic hurricane season

Hurricane Stan was the eighteenth named tropical storm and eleventh hurricane of the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season. It was also the sixth of seven tropical cyclones (three hurricanes, two of them major, three tropical storms and one tropical depression) to make landfall in Mexico. Stan was a relatively weak storm that only briefly reached hurricane status. It was embedded in a larger non-tropical system of rainstorms that dropped torrential rains in the Central American countries of Guatemala and El Salvador and in southern Mexico, causing flooding and mudslides that led to at least 1,662 and possibly up to 2,000 deaths; Stan is estimated to be directly responsible for 80 of these. Damage totaled between $1 to $2 billion (2005 USD). [ [http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/comment.html?entrynum=293&tstamp=200601 Jeff Masters' wunderground blog] ]

Meteorological history

A tropical wave, which moved off the African coast on September 17, formed a low pressure area when it reached the western Caribbean Sea and organized into a tropical depression on October 1. Off the coast of the Yucatán Peninsula, it strengthened into Tropical Storm Stan at 1:35 am CDT (0635 UTC) October 2. Stan became just the second 'S' named storm since naming began, the other being Sebastien of 1995. [National Hurricane Center. [http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/tracks1851to2007_atl_reanal.txt Atlantic Hurricane Database.] Retrieved on 2008-08-13.]

Stan made landfall on the Yucatán Peninsula and weakened to a tropical depression, but regained tropical storm strength upon reemerging into the Bay of Campeche. By 4 am CDT October 4 (0900 UTC), it had sufficiently strengthened to be given hurricane status. Stan made landfall later that morning in the east-central coast of Mexico, south of Veracruz, as a Category 1 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson hurricane scale, then weakened to a tropical storm early that afternoon. The National Hurricane Center continued issuing advisories on Stan until October 5 at 0900 UTC.

Impact

Around the time of Stan's existence, torrential rainstorms dropped upwards of 20 inches (500 mm) of rain, causing severe flash floods, mud slides, and crop damage (particularly to the coffee crop which was close to harvest) over portions of Mexico and Central America, including Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Honduras, and Costa Rica. Most of the rainstorms were non-tropical in nature and impossible to relate to the hurricane; however, the impact of the larger weather system can be considered as a whole.

As of November 11, 2005, the official death toll now stands at 1,620.

Hundreds more have been reported missing and are feared dead throughout the region. One estimate has the death toll above 2,000 in Guatemala alone. The final death toll will likely never be known due to the extensive decomposition of bodies in the mud. Note that only 80-100 of the deaths were estimated to have been as a result of Stan; the rest were not caused by Stan itself but were the result of the large system of non-tropical rains that had spawned the hurricane. [http://www.srh.noaa.gov/data/NHC/TWSAT NHC end-of-season summary] ]

Most of the reported fatalities at this point have been as a result of the flooding and mudslides, although eight of the deaths in Nicaragua were as a result of a boat carrying migrants from Ecuador and Peru that ran ashore. A large portion of the figure comes from one village alone, as a mudslide completely destroyed the village of Panabaj in Guatemala's Sololá department.

Stan has been compared to Hurricane Mitch of 1998, Hurricane Cesar-Douglas of 1996, and Hurricane Diana of 1990.

Guatemala

On October 11 at least 1,500 people were confirmed to have died, and up to 3000 were believed missing. Many communities were overwhelmed, and the worst single incident appears to have occurred in Panabaj, an impoverished Maya village in the highlands near Lake Atitlán in Sololá department. The mayor has declared that the communities are graveyards and all people who are missing are counted as dead. Piedra Grande, a hamlet in the municipality of San Pedro Sacatepéquez, was also destroyed. Floods and mudslides have obliterated the community of about 1,400 people, and it is feared that most or all of the population of the community lost their lives. The government has stated that they do not know what is going on in the southwest of the country, and particularly in the San Marcos department because a vital bridge was destroyed at El Palmar, Quetzaltenango, cutting the region off from the rest of the country. There are reported petrol shortages, including in Quetzaltenango.

El Salvador

The eruption of the Santa Ana volcano, located near the capital San Salvador, on October 1, 2005 compounded the problems, which led to even more destructive floods and mudslides from Stan.

A state of emergency was declared. According to the director of El Salvador's National Emergency Centre, 300 communities were affected by the floods, with over 54,000 people forced to flee their homes. A state of emergency has also been called for in Guatemala by President Óscar Berger where 36,559 people were reported in emergency shelters. Some looting has also been reported, a scene reminiscent of Hurricane Katrina five weeks previous.A spokesman for the Salvadoran Red Cross said that "the emergency is bigger than the rescue capacity, we have floods everywhere, bridges about to collapse, landslides and dozens of roads blocked by mudslides". The Pan-American Highway has been cut off by mudslides leading into the capital, San Salvador, as well as several other roads. 72 deaths have been confirmed in El Salvador.

Mexico

Some 100,000 inhabitants of the Sierra de los Tuxtlas region on the Gulf Coast were evacuated from their homes, and incidents of mild flooding as well as wind damage (such as uprooted trees and roofs ripped off houses) were reported from coastal areas of Veracruz, including the port of Veracruz, Boca del Río, San Andrés Tuxtla, Santiago Tuxtla, Minatitlán and Coatzacoalcos, as well as state capital Xalapa further inland. The armed forces evacuated the inhabitants of a dozen or so towns on the coastal plain, between World Heritage Site Tlacotalpan in the west and the lakeside resort of Catemaco in the east.

As the system progressed inland towards the Sierra Madre del Sur to the west of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, the states of Oaxaca and Chiapas were affected with torrential rains. Areas of Chiapas near the Guatemalan border were hit hard, particularly the coastal border town of Tapachula. In Tapachula the river overflowed its banks and caused tremendous damage (including the destruction of all the bridges leading in and out of the town), meaning that it was only accessible through the air. The state government reports that 33 rivers have broken their banks and that an indeterminate number of homes, upwards of 20 bridges, and other infrastructure have been smashed in the storm's wake.

Some areas in the Sierra Norte, in the central state of Puebla, are also flooded. Three people died in a mudslide at Xochiapulco Hill.

In addition, Pemex had evacuated 270 employees from its oil platforms in the Gulf of Mexico, although no damage has been reported and the plants have been restarted.

The Ministry of the Interior has declared states of emergency in the worst hit municipalities of five states: Chiapas, Hidalgo, Oaxaca, Puebla, and Veracruz.

Honduras

There have been 7 deaths in Honduras: 3 in Lempira department, 2 in Francisco Morazán department, 1 in Santa Bárbara department, and 1 in Comayagua department. 7042 people have had to be evacuated and 2475 homes have been destroyed, with the town of Nacaome being particularly affected because the Nacaome River broke its banks.

Retirement

The name Stan was retired in the spring of 2006 and will never be used again for an Atlantic hurricane. It was replaced with Sean for the 2011 season. [" [http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2006/s2607.htm Dennis, Katrina, Rita, Stan, and Wilma "Retired" from List of Storm Names] ." "NOAA." April 6, 2006.] Stan was the 1st retired S name since the World Meteorological Organization started retiring names in 1954. It was only the fourth of five Category 1 hurricanes to be retired since 1954, and the first since Hurricane Cesar in 1996. It was the weakest Atlantic storm to be retired for the 2005 season.

See also

* List of tropical cyclones
* List of Atlantic hurricanes
* List of 2005 Atlantic hurricane season storms
* Hurricane Mitch

External links

* [http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/archive/2005/refresh/STAN+shtml/205520.shtml NHC's archive of Hurricane Stan]
* [http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/archive/2005/tws/MIATWSAT_nov.shtml NHC's Tropical Weather Summary through November 2005]
* [http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/2005/hurricanes05.html NCDC's Atlantic hurricane season 2005 summary]
* [http://www.conred.org/eventos/tormenta_stan_octubre2005/index.php/ Cordinadora Para La Reduccion De Desastres En Guatemala (Conred)] Guatemala's Disaster Reduction Institute(in Spanish).
* [http://www.usaid.gov/locations/latin_america_caribbean/ca_flooding/ USAID (US government) information on hurricane/flood relief and recovery efforts]
* [http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/855C83AA-53BA-4AB0-9C9F-28BA2CA22ED9.htm Al Jazeera: Hundreds die in Guatemala mudslide]
* [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4322442.stm BBC: Guatemala storm deaths increase]
* [http://www.atitlan.net/video/hurricane-stan.htm video from Panajachel. Guatemala]

References