Mexico - Chasing Hurricane Dean

I flicked though the pages of the in-flight magazine to take my mind off the violent turbulence. A glossy image of turquoise water lapping a white sand beach had me transfixed. I have been on the road for weeks responding to a trail of disasters around the world. After sleepless nights and intense heat during the floods in India to the freezing cold and chaos of Peru's quake zone, nothing looked more inviting than the beaches of Mexico's Yucatan peninsula.
But the flight to Cancun that was usually packed with holidaymakers now only contained a handful of aid workers and journalists and we were not heading for "fun in the sun".
As Hurricane Dean approached, the world's news cameras were poised on Cancun's beaches. But like many hurricanes, Dean decided to take a sudden diversion. The storm, by then a category five hurricane, turned south and smashed into Quintana Roo state with ferocious 165mph (265 kph) winds and 20-feet (six-metre) storm swells. The city of Chetumal, two miles from the Belize border, took the full force of the hurricane and has become the nerve centre for humanitarian response to the region.
The luxury resorts of Cancun were spared and within two days tourists were back shopping in the high-end boutiques. The unfortunate irony is that had Dean hit the resort area of Northern Yucatan as predicted, the solidly built homes and hotels would have withstood the storm.
In stark contrast to the wealth of Cancun, Dean took a path through a much poorer area of the country and the results have been devastating to thousands of families.
When Hurricane Wilma, also rated category five, sat over Cancun for 63 hours in 2005 it caused horrendous damage. Fortunately for the people of Quintana Roo state, Dean swept through and lost power at a much faster rate than expected.
But the destruction is still widespread.
After the storm the city of Chetumal looked like a ravaged battleground. Trees were uprooted, power lines toppled and the water supply knocked out. I saw sheet metal roof panels wrapped around lampposts like ribbons.
It is the rural communities outside of Chetumal that suffered the most. The majority of villagers live in very humble, poorly built wooden homes. Hurricane Dean effortlessly smashed hundreds of these homes to the ground and peeled the roof off most of the rest.
Now residents sit in the tattered frames amongst the belongings that they were able salvage after the storm.
One woman, Maria, could hardly talk about the experience. We found her surveying the contents of her shack, sunlight streamed in through the open roof and illuminated her distressed face. "I was so afraid," she trembled as she described the moment her roof disappeared.
We are working with Mexico's civil protection unit to distribute thousands of roof tile kits in an effort to quickly restore shelter to the vulnerable population.
More rain is on the way and the waterproof tiles are being hammered onto wooden roof frames almost as soon as they are distributed. We are also providing the trucking and logistics needed to shift ton after ton of food and water from the central warehouse in Chetumal to the outlying villages where it is needed the most.
With the hectic activity of the response in Chetumal I had not been tracking Hurricane Dean's progress as it moved inland. The storm had lost much of its power when it made landfall and I was not expecting the telephone call I received. "Hidalgo is underwater," my boss said, with concern in his voice.
Dean was still on the loose over Mexico's interior and unleashing torrents of rain. I handed off the gulf response to our local coordinator and scrambled for Mexico's heartland.
Another turbulent flight and within hours I was in Pachuca, capitol of Hidalgo state and the location of Operation Blessings's Mexico head office.
Our coordinator briefed me with a worrying statistic: "We have just received 25 percent of the average annual rainfall in 26 hours," he said looking at me with a shocked expression. Our phones were ringing off the hook with flood reports coming in from all over the state but there was one name that we kept hearing - "Tulancingo".
Never have I seen water damage in an urban setting as dire as what I saw in Tulancingo on our arrival that evening. I have seen mud huts and wooden shacks washed away by floodwaters but not heavy stone buildings. In just six hours Tulancingo received eight months' worth of rain!
Dean had drawn up water during its path over the Caribbean and unleashed it in flash floods that inundated the city drainage system. Water and mud engulfed homes and businesses, submerged cars and destroyed classrooms. A small river that runs through the city center rose twenty feet above its normal level and swept the foundations out from under homes in its path.
Tulancingo has just been classed as a disaster zone by Mexico's federal government, and it is now estimated that hurricane Dean's rains affected 100,000 people in Hidalgo state.
We found one group of 120 families sheltering in animal pens at the city fairground.
Two days after the floods many families were still unable to return to their homes. Those that can gain access are met with scenes of desolation. As we wade through neighbourhoods delivering relief kits it is heart-wrenching to see poor families shoveling their ruined belongings into piles of festering mud.
Many people have lost everything and it will take many months for the city to recover. But before things get any better they could get worse as the putrid mud and stagnant water have the potential to fuel disease.
Hurricanes look so menacing in satellite images. The huge swirls of thick cloud with their cycloptic eye immediately suggest destruction on a massive scale.
We are captivated by these storms as they bear down on civilisation. At least, it seems, until the circular formation dissipates.
Once Dean had made landfall and the winds weakened, its view from space looked like any other cloud cover anywhere. The world turned its attention elsewhere thinking that Dean was old news.
But hurricane Dean was not going down without a fight and its destructive piece de resistance was the horrendous rain in Hidalgo.
The 2007 Atlantic hurricane season has only just begun. Let Dean be a warning to the region and the world - never underestimate the potential brutal power of a hurricane once it begins to weaken.