Churches in various Latin American countries are deeply involved in response to a quadruple whammy inflicted by a powerful earthquake and three unprecedented hurricanes that brought death and devastation to Peru and much of Central America.

“The current situation in Puerto Cabezas, Nicaragua and the Miskito Coast is devastating,” reported Summer Palmer, a long-term missionary volunteer with the Southern Baptist International Mission Board. “The aftermath of Hurricane Felix will most likely destroy the rice crops in the whole region.”

The town was hit almost head on by Hurricane Felix, a category five hurricane that also dumped heavy rain on Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala.

The early-September storm was the second level-five hurricane to hit Central America and Mexico in a two week span—the first time that two such storms had struck land in the same year. In addition, while Felix was pounding away at Central America, another hurricane, Henriette, made a second landfall along the west coast of Mexico.

And, in mid-August, over 550 people were killed in an earthquake that measured 8.0 on the Richter scale and virtually destroyed the town of Pisco.

In Nicaragua, over 80 percent of the houses in Puerto Cabezas were reported to have lost their roofs in the storm according to information supplied by Bill Lurwick of Kansas radio station KJIL who has led work groups to the town.

The region is populated by 150,000 people who live in jungle settlements. The residents are descendants of Indians, European settlers and African slaves who make their living primarily from fishing and farming.

The town and surrounding communities are virtually unreachable except by airplane or boat. Summer Palmer reports that the main bridge connecting the community to other parts of Nicaragua is out of service which means that supplies and relief equipment will be difficult to obtain.

“The real struggles will come as it gets more difficult to find food,” she reported to Missionary Journalist. “The airplanes are flying in now, but only one flight a day. More survey teams will be going out in the next few days to asses the damage in the more remote areas of the Miskito Region. Sinsin, Santa Marta and Twapi are in bad shape.”