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Hurricane Mitch was the most destructive storm in the Atlantic Basin in the past
200 years. It reached sustained wind speeds of 180 mph while moving into the
western Caribbean but the main destruction resulted from intense rainfall.
During the week of October 26, 1998, Hurricane Mitch, one of the strongest
and most damaging storms ever to hit the Caribbean and Central America, swept
across Honduras, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Guatemala, Belize and Costa Rica. The
loss of life and devastation to property from the torrential rains, floods and
landslides was enormous. Effects of the natural disaster were intensified by
man-made factors. Large-scale deforestation and cultivation of marginal land
induced by population pressure triggered massive mudslides. Flooding was
exacerbated by lack of adequate watershed management. The rural poor, with
limited access to land, often live in marginal, high-risk areas, and thus bore
the brunt of the effects of the disaster.
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