Hurricane Stan hit Greg Johnson's friends

When the powers that be named Hurricane Stan, we had no idea that classmate Greg Johnson would have a personal stake in the outcome of the storm. Read on.

VERACRUZ, Mexico - Hurricane Stan barreled into Mexico's Gulf coast Tuesday, pummeling this major port city with heavy rain and punishing waves, and forcing the evacuation of thousands of residents and several offshore oil platforms.
Stan packed maximum sustained winds near 80 mph, the National Hurricane Center in Miami reported. It was centered just inland about 85 miles southeast of the city of 425,000 people and was moving southwest at about 7 mph.
Forecasters said wind and rain from the Category 1 hurricane were also reaching Central America, causing floods and landslides and leaving at least 38 people dead in
El Salvador. Rain was still falling Tuesday in much of Central America, driving thousands from their homes in El Salvador and Guatemala.
Veracruz's busy port was closed, schools canceled classes and officials at a nearby nuclear power plant prepared the facility for the hurricane's arrival. Thousands of residents abandoned their homes and stayed in dozens of shelters set up all along the coast.
It was unclear how the oil platform evacuations would affect production at Pemex, the world's third-biggest oil producer and a major supplier to the United States. The company pumps about 3.4 million barrels a day of crude, just over half of which it exports.
Forecasters said the storm could dump up to 10 inches of rain in some areas, and warned residents that flooding and landslides were possible.
It raced across the Yucatan peninsula on Sunday, buffeting the region with and rain. No major damage was reported.

Local connection
Classmate Greg Johnson, it turns out, has a personal connection to Hurricane Stan. Here's some background: Greg has been going to the village of San Lucas, Guatemala for the last 9 years, via mission trips through his church, Oak Grove Presbyterian Church, in Bloomington.
It’s a town of about 15,000 people, sitting in a spectacularly beautiful setting – right on Lake Atitlan, which is surrounded by three inactive volcanoes.
Dennis Evans runs a program in San Lucas whereby needy junior and senior high students can attend school. Greg sponsors one of the kids from Colonia Pampojila (a small village about 10 minutes from San Lucas), which is mentioned below. Greg knows Dennis very well, and gets periodic e-mails from him about the sponsored kids and other events occurring in San Lucas.
Here is one of those Emails and let the record show that Hurricane Stan would like to apologize for the ruin he has wrought.

From: Dennis Evans
Sent: Thursday, October 06, 2005 3:29

Greetings from San Lucas.

Electricity has just come back to San Lucas - we are without water or regular phones. We had been without water for nine days, due to electrical problems - three transformers burnt out and replacements had to be brought from Costa Rica. The problem was just about fixed when tropical storm Stan hit us, on Tuesday.

Main points.
San Lucas is at the moment completely cut off - the three roads leading from San Lucas are all blocked by landslips, bridges out, and so on.

Regular telephones are out. I am sending this using my emergency email address, from an internet cafe with a satellite connection (please continue to use my regular email address brdennis@itelgua.com to contact me)

A local evangelical church is looking after two hundred people evacuated from their homes - others are being looked after in a local school and in the town hall. Several homes have been flooded, although the main preoccupation of the people is landslips.

There are three hundred evacuees in the Colonia Pampojila. There are reports of problems in the Nueva Providencia - news from other villages is scanty and confused.

Some houses have been destroyed, and many filled with two or three feet of mud, in the nearby Pampojila plantation, which has been evacuated. The road in front of the finca is filled with boulders and a thick layer of mud

The Mayor has reacted rapidly and very well, and the people have responded magnificently, collecting supplies, groceries, blankets etc for the evacuees. We had power for a while last night, and in response to an appeal by the Mayor, hundreds of people were on the road this morning, taking groceries, corn, etc to those affected.

We are better off than many other towns around Lake Atitlan. In Panajachel, the river burst its banks, taking several houses and a bridge - deaths are reported.
San Antonio Polopo (a lakeside village nestling in the cliffs before you get to Panajachel) is reported to have been badly affected. There are reports of major landslips from the volcano Santiago, and there are reports of 15 - 50 deaths in three villages near Santiago Atitlan. People came from Santiago yesterday by boat, to get medical supplies for the injured.

I'll send more information as soon as the phone lines are operational. I wanted you to know that in San Lucas, so far, there has been damage, but there are no reports of injuries or deaths.

Please pass on this information to anyone who might be interested.

Dennis

(Classmates wanting to lend a hand to Greg's village can do so by contacting Trailboss@swpub.com. We'll put you in touch with Greg.)