LEILA FADEL, HOST:
It's been almost two weeks since Hurricane Melissa, a Category 5 storm, slammed into Jamaica. Insurance companies expect the damage to top $4 billion. NPR's Eyder Peralta has been traveling the island, and he joins us now from Montego Bay. Good morning, Eyder.
EYDER PERALTA, BYLINE: Hey. Good morning, Leila.
FADEL: So let's start with what you're seeing. How's the recovery going?
PERALTA: I mean, look, we've driven for hours, criss-crossing the most affected areas. One good thing is that the government has cleared the roads so aid and goods can move freely. And a lot of regular Jamaicans have loaded their cars with goods, and they're handing out aid along the road. In the sky, we've seen the U.S. military flying Chinooks - those big, two-propeller helicopters - and they're delivering aid. But we've also noticed power lines are still down, and we've seen few crews trying to fix them. A lot of people don't have water, don't have food, so you see them at rivers bathing. I talked to Sarah and Delano Chambers (ph). They were on the side of the road asking for aid.
DELANO CHAMBERS: You can't go on there. You can't [inaudible].
PERALTA: And so you just have to write a sign?
SARAH CHAMBERS: That sign.
D CHAMBERS: Like that.
S CHAMBERS: We want water and food.
D CHAMBERS: Water and food and everything.
PERALTA: You know, and right now they have no jobs. Their homes are destroyed. They're sleeping outside, and the only thing they feel that they can do is hold up a sign asking for aid.
FADEL: Wow. And tell us a little bit more about the damage, the physical damage you've been seeing.
PERALTA: In western Jamaica, the damage is apocalyptic. I mean, we've seen nearly 200-year-old stone churches turned to rubble. Some small villages are just piles of wood. One of the stunning things from this storm is what it did to the mountains. They used to be lush and green, and now they are gray. We have seen miles of trees toppled and whole forests stripped of their leaves. In a town called Bluefields, I met Glenwick Clarke, who's a beekeeper. And he says even the bees right now can't find any food in the wild, so they're venturing into people's homes.
GLENWICK CLARKE: They are really looking for food 'cause they are at the brink of starvations. And it's not just the bees. They're talking about the butterfly, talking about the doctor birds. All of them are in danger of dying.
FADEL: Wow.
PERALTA: So this storm has affected everything - from the humans to churches, right down to the bees. And when farmers plant again, Clarke is worried that there may not be enough pollinators. Already, the government says that most crops in what is the breadbasket of Jamaica have been totally wiped out.
FADEL: Wow. OK. So let's talk about the future, then. What's the government saying? What are people planning?
PERALTA: You know, I've been focused on that question in my reporting. And scientists say that it's clear that this type of storm, with rapid intensification and off-the-charts wind speeds, is made possible by climate change. And nearly everyone I've talked to here, from civilians to politicians, say that in order to keep living here, things have to change. And there's one fascinating example. If you look across the hardest-hit areas, what you find is that some houses did survive. It was those that were built of steel and concrete. And interestingly, they were built with what Jamaicans call a slab, and that's a concrete roof. One lady whose house did survive said she wanted a traditional wood roof because she liked to hear the rainfall, but now she's happy that her husband insisted on a slab.
I spoke to a climate change chief for the government here. And he said, this is not some hands-up, we-don't-know-what-to-do moment. He said, we have the data. We know what to do to make Jamaica more resilient. We just need the political will and the money to do that. Of course, those two things are very complicated.
FADEL: NPR's Eyder Peralta, reporting from Montego Bay, Jamaica. Thank you, Eyder.
PERALTA: Thank you, Leila. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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