'Mitch Woke Us Up'

Jed Hoffman was the Catholic Relief Services country representative for Guatemala when Hurricane Mitch struck parts of Central America. He later served as CRS' Latin America and Caribbean regional director from 1999 to 2006, where he helped devise the new emergency strategy and oversaw the region's recovery efforts. Now working in the HIV and AIDS sector at CRS' headquarters in Baltimore, Hoffman still keeps files of documentation on Mitch within his reach. It's an event, he says, that should never be forgotten.

CRS worked with local community members to build back better after Hurricane Mitch. Photo by CRS staff

Kai T. Hill:

What was your initial reaction to the devastation?

Jed Hoffman:

I didn't really see how bad the damage was until I went up in a helicopter with the Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance [OFDA] people the day after—we flew down the Motagua river valley to Puerto Barrios and then up Lake Izabal and up the Polochic watershed. The flooding and crop and home damage was immense and impressive from the air. We landed at several places in the Motagua and a few villages along the Polochic that were completely flooded and cut off from all supplies. The people were crowded on the little high ground and were in a state of shock to see all the banana and melon plantations and the small family farm crops washed away.

Hill:

Had you ever seen anything of this magnitude before?

Hoffman:

After the Mexico City earthquake in 1985 and in some areas after the first Niño disaster in Peru in the early 80's—the damage was comparable, but more limited in geographic scope.

Hill:

With destruction of this magnitude, how did you know where to begin?

Hoffman:

We started before the disaster struck so we were on the ground with the affected populations and already coordinating with the public and private authorities and donors. The first four priorities were rescue, food, water and temporary shelter.

Hill:

This was more than a typical relief effort, it completely changed the way in which CRS responds as an agency. Why is that?

Hoffman:

Mitch woke us up. Before Mitch, CRS did all of the components of disaster response and recovery but it wasn't a comprehensive process. Mitch was such a huge disaster that it was time for us to draw up the framework. The process starts with saving lives or meeting people's basic needs during emergencies, including providing food or making sure that children don't die from diarrhea. It's designed to mitigate suffering and make sure that people don't die as a result of their vulnerability. The restoring livelihoods part required us to focus our income generation and development expertise with local organizations to restore agricultural production and normal economic activity so that people recovered their access to basic necessities. In terms of reconstruction, our aim was to work with the local communities to build back better than what the community had. CRS was in a unique position of having huge programs in all four countries.

Hill:

Are we prepared to react and respond should another hurricane or disaster like Mitch strike?

Hoffman:

We were able to take many of the lessons learned from Mitch and institutionalize them in the Latin American and Caribbean emergency response strategy, including forward placement of emergency supplies, rapid response protocols, and so forth.

Hill:

Does any story or anything you saw during this process stick out in your mind that you can share with us?

Hoffman:

When I circled around with the OFDA helicopter over a small village that was completely flooded except the churchyard and part of the town soccer field, I spotted a four-by-four vehicle parked in front of the church. As we circled in to land on the soccer field, I recognized the vehicle—it was a CRS vehicle belonging to one of the forward response teams I had sent into the Polochic valley three days earlier. When we landed, the entire town came out of the church and among the crowd were the three CRS team members with their CRS T-shirts, hats and name tags. We had interrupted a town meeting that was called to discuss their emergency response and recovery needs! The OFDA official was duly impressed—talk about rapid response and community involvement!

Kai T. Hill is an associate web producer for CRS. She works at the Baltimore headquarters.