Into the Sea Genre: Narrative Nonfiction Author’s Purpose: Inform, Influence
NARRATIVE NONFICTION Isl… · As You Read What obstacles does Puerto Rico face in its recovery?...
Transcript of NARRATIVE NONFICTION Isl… · As You Read What obstacles does Puerto Rico face in its recovery?...
4 SCHOLASTIC SCOPE • SEPTEMBER 2018
What obstacles does Puerto Rico face in its recovery? As You Read
NARRATIVE
NONFICTION
nonfiction that uses
literary techniques
Everywhere 15-year-old Salvador Gómez-
Colón looked, he saw ruin and hopelessness.
Just days before, Salvador had been
living a happy life in San Juan, the capital of
Puerto Rico, an island in the Caribbean Sea. He went
to school and swim practice. He walked through
the streets of Old San Juan, taking pictures of the
beautiful churches and bright turquoise and pink
houses that had stood for centuries. He spent hot
SorrowOne year ago, Puerto Rico was devastated by a hurricane.
This is the true story of 15-year-old Salvador Gómez-Colón, who kept hope alive. By Kristin Lewis
Island of
Nonfiction
SCOPE.SCHOLASTIC.COM • SEPTEMBER 2018 5
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afternoons in the park near his home.
But now, that life was gone.
The day before—September 20, 2017—Hurricane
Maria had hit the island. To Salvador, it looked like
an atomic bomb had been dropped. The streets
were filled with fallen power lines, wrecked cars, and
collapsed buildings. Homes were flooded with dirty
water. Trees had been snapped in half or ripped
from the ground.
Puerto Rico was in ruins. There was no electricity,
no lights, no cell phone service, no internet—no way
to contact loved ones and find out if they were OK.
That evening, as the sun set, Salvador watched
the island go dark. A feeling of hopelessness crept
over him. He imagined people in the pitch-black
night stumbling around the broken shells of their
homes. What if they fell? With hospitals
barely operating and no way to call for help,
Sorrow Loíza, one of the
towns hardest hit by Hurricane Maria
Island of
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Caribbean Sea is
prone to stormy
weather. But in the
days leading up to
Hurricane Maria,
many people sensed
that this storm would
be different. Salvador
listened to news reports
about the storm as it came
closer. Meteorologists
predicted that Maria was
going to be worse than
anything the island had seen in 80
years.
They were right.
The Hurricane’s WrathAs the weather predictions
grew worse, thousands rushed
to the airport, buying seats on
any flight off the island they
could get. Some 4,000 others
went to shelters. But like most of
Puerto Rico’s 3.5 million people,
Salvador and his family chose to
stay home. They lived in a sturdy
building, where they thought
they’d be safe.
Still, they made preparations.
They stocked up on water, food,
and gas for their car.
But nothing could have
prepared them for Maria’s wrath.
Hurricane Maria struck Puerto
Rico at just past 6 a.m. The
storm stretched nearly 60 miles
across—four times the length of
Manhattan. It moved at a snail’s
pace—10 miles per hour. That
meant it hung over the island for
12 terrible hours.
The winds blew across the
island at more than 150 miles
per hour. They snapped trees
and telephone poles. Roofs were
torn away. Windows shattered.
Tree trunks flew through the air.
The storm dropped more rain
than Puerto Rico usually gets in
six months. The deluge swelled
rivers and canals, sending water
gushing into neighborhoods
and bursting a dam. Seawater
from the Caribbean churned
what would happen to them?
“To me, that sun setting was
hope leaving,” Salvador says.
But what could he do?
A Unique PlacePuerto Rico is about 1,000
miles southeast of Florida. The
island is famous for its beauty.
It’s part of the U.S. but is not a
state. It is what is known as a
“territory.” Puerto Ricans are U.S.
citizens. They follow U.S. laws
and elect members of their own
government, but they cannot
vote in presidential elections.
In Congress, they have one
representative, who cannot vote
on laws.
One of the island’s main
industries is tourism. Millions
of people visit Puerto Rico every
year to enjoy the sandy beaches,
sweeping mountains, and lush
rainforests. You’ll hear Spanish
spoken in every part of the
island—it’s the primary language.
San Juan, where Salvador lives, is
the largest city. It’s a place where
you can eat delicious tostones and
empanadas and watch the locals
dance in the streets to live music.
Hurricanes have always been
a problem for Puerto Rico; the
VIRGINISLANDS(U.S.)
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San Juan, the capital of Puerto Rico, is famous for its beautiful beaches and
colorful buildings.
into coastal cities and villages.
According to one survivor,
houses looked like islands in a
muddy lake.
Meanwhile, hillsides became
waterlogged. Large chunks
of mud careened down from
the mountains, burying cars
and smashing homes. Dozens
of people died in the storm.
Thousands more died in the
following weeks and months.
Salvador and his mother,
grandparents, and two step-
sisters tried to wait out the storm
in their eighth-floor apartment.
But when rainwater began to
flow into their apartment and the
wind seemed like it would shatter
the windows, they knew they
needed to get out.
They found shelter in a tiny
room on the ground floor, along
with some neighbors.
They were trapped there for
hours. The wind was deafening.
It sounded as though the city was
being bombed.
And then, at last, the skies
cleared.
State of CrisisCleaning up after a hurricane
of Maria’s magnitude would
have been daunting for any
community. But there were
special challenges in Puerto
Rico. The island has high levels
of poverty. At the time of the
hurricane, Puerto Rico was
bankrupt. Much of the island’s
infrastructure was extremely old
and didn’t work well. The power
grid (the network of power plants
that produce electricity and all
the power lines that carry that
electricity to people) had not
been upgraded in decades.
The island had stood little
chance against the storm.
After the storm, there was
virtually no power on the island.
Refrigerators and freezers
stopped humming, and the food
inside rotted. Gas pumps didn’t
work, so cars and trucks couldn’t
be refueled. ATMs became
useless, so no one could get cash.
Without electricity, hospitals had
to run on generators, but many
generators had been ruined by
the storm. Many patients died
because the machines keeping
them alive no longer
worked.
Then there was the
problem of water. Without
power, water could not
be pumped to people’s
faucets. Toilets could
not be flushed. Sewers
stopped working. Human
waste flowed through
waterways.
In the days after the
storm, Salvador had
many questions. When
would school reopen?
When would
power be restored?
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This photograph was taken a day
after the hurricane in Cataño, about 8 miles
from San Juan.
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When would phones work?
With no food in grocery stores,
how would his family eat after
their food ran out? What would
happen if he were to have an
asthma attack? With hospitals
barely operating and no open
pharmacies, what would he do?
Still, Salvador felt lucky.
He and his family were alive,
and their apartment, though
damaged, was safe to live in. He
began listening to reports on the
radio about what was going on
across the rest of the island. He
heard stories of destroyed villages
and of families losing all their
belongings. There were stories of
people who had no food to eat
and no water to drink. Hundreds
were dying because they could
not get the help they needed.
“We were in a state of crisis,”
Salvador says. “I thought, at least
I am safe here, but just imagine
people who live in wooden
homes or have zinc [a light metal]
roofs—which would be the first
to blow off. It was scary thinking
about what other people were
going through.”
Salvador could only wonder:
With so much destruction, how
long would it take Puerto Rico to
recover? Would it recover at all?
Every time the sun set, that
same creeping hopelessness
returned to him. But then one
night, Salvador had had enough.
He would not let himself feel
helpless.
He would do something.
A Bold IdeaSalvador thought about two
of the biggest problems facing
people in the most devastated
areas: living without lights and
having no way to keep their
clothes clean. He realized that
two items could restore some
hope and dignity to them.
First, a solar lamp. Solar lamps
don’t run on electricity. Instead,
they are charged by sunlight.
With solar lamps, people without
power could have some light at
night.
Second, a hand-operated
washing machine. Like solar
lamps, these washing machines
don’t require electricity. Many
people had nothing to wear but
the clothes on their backs, which
had become contaminated by
the floodwaters. Salvador knew
that with no way to wash clothes,
diseases would spread.
Salvador wanted to find a way
to get these lamps and washing
machines to those who
needed them most. When
he told his mom what he
wanted to do, her response
was simple: You must do it.
But you can’t give up. You
must finish what you start.
Salvador decided to
create a crowdsourcing
webpage to raise money.
Before long, donations
were pouring in from all
over the world.
But the logistics of
buying and shipping lamps and
washing machines were a big
challenge. Puerto Rico’s ports
were backed up with ships. Roads
were littered with debris. Still,
Salvador did not give up. Even
after his school reopened a few
weeks after the hurricane, he kept
Salvador delivers solar lamps to a community without power. Salvador
named his initiative C+Feel=Hope, meaning “See the light, feel clean, have hope.”
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working. He sent texts and made
calls.
“I was like, ‘Wait a second,
I’m doing algebra and there are
people dying a few miles from
me,’” he says.
A Painfully Slow RecoveryIn the following weeks and
months, many people continued
to live without electricity. And
Salvador continued to help
those people. He raised more
than $140,000. He delivered
4,100 solar lamps and 1,100
washing machines to 15 towns
around the island. These
items were life changing
for communities that were
receiving little aid and were
starting to lose hope.
The rebuilding of Puerto
Rico has been painfully
slow. Restoring power has
been among the biggest
challenges, especially to remote
communities in the mountains.
Power lines had to be strung for
miles across narrow mountain
roads and through thick forests.
Some areas are so remote that
materials couldn’t be hauled by
trucks; they had to be carried in
by helicopter.
Three months after the storm,
half the island was still without
power. At press time in early
June, about 11,000 people still
didn’t have electricity. Even in
San Juan, where Salvador lives,
the power was still going out
intermittently. Cell and internet
service were too.
“We’ve grown used to living
in a state of uncertainty,” says
Salvador.
“It’s the Hope”As this article went to the
printer, Puerto Rico was heading
into another hurricane season.
The government has taken steps
to prepare. But thousands of
Puerto Ricans are still homeless
or living in homes that don’t
have roofs—only tarps. For these
people, even a minor storm
carries serious risks.
About 250,000 Puerto Ricans
have left the island for mainland
America - mostly Florida.
Will they return?
That’s a question no one can
answer for sure.
But Salvador does not dwell
on Puerto Rico’s problems. There
is too much work to be done. He
keeps his mind on the future.
“It’s the hope,” he says,
thinking about what is helping
him and others face the island’s
challenges. “Hope that things
will get better, hope that helping
each other will get us through.
Hope that we will persevere.” •
How does this story show that one person can make a difference, even in the face of overwhelming obstacles? Answer this question in a well-organized essay. Use text evidence. Send your essay to Puerto Rico Contest. Five winners will get Eye of the Storm by Amy Cherrix. Get this
activity online.�
Writing Contest
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is one of the main U.S. government relief organizations. After a disaster, FEMA provides food, water, shelter, and medical care. After Hurricane Maria, FEMA was criticized for what many saw as an inadequate response. They pointed to FEMA’s swift response in Houston, Texas, which had been devastated by a hurricane just three weeks earlier, and wondered why Puerto Rico didn’t get the same level of support. For example, in some cases it took FEMA months to deliver tarps—which can be placed over damaged roofs to protect homes until repairs can be made. As a result, many houses that could have been saved were lost.
After a Disaster: The Government’s Response