MEXICO CITY – Civil authorities and church workers began distributing emergency supplies and surveying damage the day after Hurricane Dean crossed the Yucatan Peninsula. Meanwhile, communities on the Gulf of Mexico were bracing for the storm’s second landfall Aug. 22. Father Francisco Velazquez Trejo, a director for Caritas Mexico in the state of Campeche on the western side of the Yucatan Peninsula, said the hurricane had flooded the island city of Ciudad del Carmen. Dean also caused widespread damage to the region’s agricultural fields and communities of indigenous Maya, many of whom live in impoverished conditions. “The region’s poorest inhabitants were the worst hit,” Father Velazquez said.


