TEGUCIGALPA, Oct 2 (Reuters) – A huge fire destroyed or damaged more than 200 houses and businesses on the Honduran island of Guanaja on Saturday, forcing hundreds of residents to flee for safety and ravaging the tourism-dependent resort, relief authorities said.
Dramatic video footage shared on social media showed rows of seaside houses engulfed in flames and wooden homes collapsing in Guanaja, a Caribbean island about 70 kilometres (44 miles) off the north coast of Honduras.
Honduran Air Force dropped water on the island to douse the fire but not before it had destroyed many homes. Footage taken after the inferno was brought under control showed dozens of concrete houses with no roofs and windows.
“We can confirm that we have no human losses but vast material losses,” said Max Gonzales, minister of the National System for Risk Management and National Contingencies (SINAGER) agency.
Four people were injured in the blaze, which destroyed 90 houses and damaged another 120, including some used as businesses, Gonzales said.
The fire broke out before dawn and residents struggled to bring it under control as the island does not have a firefighting service.
Guanaja is one of the country’s three picturesque Bay Islands, where snorkelers and divers come to see dolphins and a big coral reef.
Subscribe here for just .08 cents per day to read subscriber content, join the PVDN newsletter, and browse with site ad-free. Support local news.
Trending news on PVDN
- Government stops construction on four condominium developments in Puerto Vallarta for violations The Secretary of Environment (Semarnat) in Jalisco, Raúl Rodgríguez Rosales, reported that the government agency stopped the construction of four condominium developments in Puerto Vallarta for not complying with regulations.
- Investigation opened into taxi driver who intentionally hit and killed a woman in Puerto Vallarta The State Prosecutor’s Office is conducting investigations under the femicide protocol with a gender perspective, to clarify the facts which a woman lost her life due to being run over by a taxi, in what is believed to be intentional, in the municipality of Puerto Vallarta, yesterday, January 29, 2023, at approximately 8:09 p.m.
- Canadian woman hospitalized after being critically injured by rogue wave during her Puerto Vallarta honeymoon vacation A Canadian woman remains on a ventilator in a hospital after she was struck by a rogue wave while on her honeymoon in Mexico. Cory Moe, who is a long-term care nurse back in Carnduff, Saskatchewan, was in Puerto Vallarta with her husband Dalton for a delayed honeymoon and the pair were enjoying the water.…
- Mexico outsources justice in its most high-profile cases to the United States The Federal Prosecutor’s Office for the Eastern District of New York has become an outsourcing agency for the Mexican government, since at least in the last five years, drug traffickers and high-profile criminals, who were not prosecuted for their crimes in Mexico, have been brought to trial and sentenced in the United States. The trial…
- With new explosion and 249 minutes of tremors in the last 24-hours, warning about Mexico’s most dangerous volcano is issued In the last 24 hours, at least 128 exhalations, 249 minutes of tremors, a minor explosion, and a volcanotectonic earthquake have been recorded, which is why the population is urged not to approach the volcano.