The Abinader administration is assessing the damages of the heavy rains over the past Friday, 17 November and Saturday, 18 November 2023 weekend and promising help to mitigate the damages. Insurance companies estimate the damages in more than a billion pesos.
Yet it is the tragic nine deaths on Saturday, 18 November 2023 at the 27 de Febrero Avenue underpass in Santo Domingo that may mark a before and after for the Dominican Republic. Three American citizens died when a retainer wall of the underpass collapsed.
Two Haitians, one documented and the other still unnamed, were also in the tragedy. The Ministry of Public Works has yet to issue a report on the findings of its investigation.
The rains set a new record in intensity on 18 November 2023. The Weather Office had warned the rains would be heavy, reminding people of the flooding of 4 November 2022 in the city that had brought 266 mm of rain to the capital city. The showers on 18 November 2023 were 431 mm, almost double of that of the memorable 4 November flash floods.
What makes the collapse of the retainer wall worse is knowing that back in 1999 when the underpass was built and the retainer walls were first installed, the Dominican Association of Engineers, Architects and Surveyors (Codia) warned of the vulnerability of these. Back then, the Ministry of Public Works under minister Diandino Peña only anchored one of four sections, despite the recommendations of expert engineers that there was a serious problem in the design. Remedial action was not taken during the three terms of Leonel Fernandez, nor the two terms of Danilo Medina nor during the first three years of Luis Abinader.
President Luis Abinader, in his weekly Monday press conference on 20 November, acknowledged the responsibility of the Dominican government. He said the problem was an incorrect design. The Ministry of Public Works carries out routine maintenance of the underpasses and tunnels.
President Abinader announced a new committee to compile assessments to major infrastructure nationwide and make recommendations to his government. Very vocal geological engineer Osiris de Leon will lead the effort with the co-participation of leading engineers, university rectors and university researchers. The committee should render a report on the infrastructures and risks in six-month time.
Flash flooding and mudslides affected populated areas and those near rivers and gullies on 17 and 18 November. President Luis Abinader drove home what people have a hard time digesting. “The country has to be aware that climate change is a reality with unforeseen, intense and out-of-season phenomena,” he said.
The blunt truth is that extreme weather conditions are here to stay and can even worsen.
The media is assessing what happened and the corrections that need to be put in place.
Alicia Ortega in her Monday evening report, El Informe con Alicia Ortega, on 20 November summarized the situation for her viewers.
A panel on Esta Noche con Mariasela on 20 November 2023, summed up what has to be done. The panelists, Martín Concepción, former director of the Colegio Dominicano de Ingenieros, Arquitectos y Agrimensores (CODIA); environmentalist Luis Carvajal; geologist-engineer Osiris de León; structural engineer Hilton Lee Astwood; and Waldys Taveras, director of the Greater Santo Domingo commonwealth, stressed the country needs to prepare and take preventive actions.
The panelists explained that what is different today is the magnitude of the storms. Climate change brings the heat that is exacerbating the rains. There will be more hot summers with lots of rains. There will be extreme draughts as nature redistributes the heat exacerbated by human actions.
Each resident in the Dominican Republic needs to access where one lives and works and goes about daily living and the vulnerabilities in these areas. People are warned to take preventive actions and be ready because the rains will happen again and again.
People need to understand what it means when the Weather Office says there will be x amount of millimeters of rain; how this translates to one’s surroundings.
The conclusion is that no one should die when there are heavy rains. Those that die do so as a result of negligence of the person and the authorities.
The panelists stressed that the government needs to tackle the rainwater drainage projects, especially in the capital city where action on these has been postponed for decades as debates continue regarding which is the best project. Several projects have been presented and the drafts filed away.
Municipal expert Waldys Taveras said on the Esta Noche con Mariasela TV program on Channel 9 that the government got a head start to improve drainage when the construction of the Santo Domingo metro opened a major north-south tunnel down incorporated under the Maximo Gomez Avenue. There is another tunnel under Tiradentes Avenue that drains to Banco Agricola on the sea-fronting Malecon, and a third on the Nuñez de Caceres Avenues, also all the way down to the Caribbean Sea. City drainage needs to be connected to these main drains. A fourth drainage solution was started on the Luperon and needs to be concluded to Km 12 of Haina. These would provide the north-south drainage of the city. Work needs to start to carry out the projects by phases as the funds become available.
Other reasons for the delay in governments carrying out these needed underground waterworks is that the projects are underground and the voters will forget the investment. Furthermore, these will take several governments to be completed. One government will carry out the expense, and another government will inaugurate it.
On the other hand, Waldys Taveras called for the government to implement the law that prohibits single-use plastics that fill city drains with garbage. He mentioned the 692 capital city drains are worthless because they fill up with plastic garbage.
Environmentalist Luis Carvajal was critical of actions of the city government of Mayor Carolina Mejia that have aggravated the cement jungle that Santo Domingo is becoming with new authorized high rises where there were previously green patios. Carvajal said the present trend for asphalt or cement coverage of the streets is turning the streets into water canals. Even parks built by the city government are mostly concrete playgrounds.
Unfortunately, it may have to take the nine deaths of Saturday, 18 November 2023, for the Dominican government to decide it cannot keep on postponing critical infrastructure solutions. Perhaps this time the tragedy will not be forgotten until the next rain episode. Program host Mariasela Alvarez concludes that the Dominican state is likely to be confronted with a legal suit for damages by the Puerto Rican victims, four of whom were driving in from the airport with a Dominican friend to spend a vacation here. “The tragedy was avoidable,” Alvarez concluded as the program came to an end. Program co-host, National District senator for the ruling Modern Revolutionary Party (PRM) Faride Raful remarked referring to the Dominican state: “It is liable.”
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El Informe con Alicia Ortega
Esta Noche con Mariasela
El Dia
El Nuevo Dia
Diario Libre
Diario Libre
Diario Libre
Listin Diario
Listin Diario
21 November 2023
PS: The victims were identified as: 70-year old Omar Alejandro Méndez Avilés; 31-year old Solange María Méndez; 35-year old Haitian Bonet Dobelier; 75-year old Ramón Martínez Cesani; 68-year old Awilda Vásquez Burgos; 32-year old María Nereyda Martínez Vásquez; her husband, Michael Orozco Marín; retired Police general, 65-year old Eduardo Cabrera Castillo; and a Haitian woman that did not have ID documents with her.