BELIZE CITY (Reuters) - Flash floods caused by tropical storm Arthur have killed at least five people in southeastern Belize, including a toddler, the government of the tiny Central American country said on Wednesday.
Arthur, the first storm of the year in the Atlantic, dumped over 11 inches of rain across Belize this week as it moved inland, also drenching southern Mexican states.
The body of a 2-year-old boy was found on Tuesday evening. His father had struggled for half an hour in turbulent floodwaters before the infant was washed away.
Two people from the southeastern district of Stann Creek were still missing on Wednesday.
Belize, wedged between Mexico and Guatemala with a population of just 300,000, is best known for its laid-back atmosphere, palm-fringed islands and coral reefs.
Torrential rains from Arthur -- which have also left swathes of southern Mexico waterlogged -- swelled rivers in Belize and wiped away two bridges in the south, severing key transport arteries for Belize's farming and fishing industries.
"This was really a kind of freak occurrence that with the best will in the world, and all the resources in the world, we could not have anticipated," Prime Minister Dean Barrow, who became Belize's first black leader on taking office in February, said this week.
Authorities estimated that 13,000 people across the country were affected by Arthur.
Belize is the last unexplored frontier near our borders, a naturalist's paradise! Belize is a beautiful, peaceful country in Central America in the heart of the ancient Maya World. Ruins abound, and it is the archaeologists dreamland. It is also one of the best kept secrets of the Caribbean.The ancient Mayan civilization once lived throughout Belize, and over 600 of their fascinating ancient cities can still be seen here.
The history of the Mayans began a long time ago, around 2500 B.C. The oldest site appears to be Cuello in Orange Walk. Then came the pre-classic era in which the cities of Lamanai, home to the largest pre-classic structure in the Mayan world, and Cerros prospered. In the classic period, the crowning period for the Mayan Civilization, the enormous sites of Caracol and El Pilar rose out of the forest and ceremonial centers like Xunantunich built lovely temples and pyramids. The prosperity of the Maya didn't last forever, and in 900 A.D. most of the great Maya centres collapsed. But the culture and outposts of the civilization were still alive and cities like Santa Rita and Lamanai still were inhabited when the Spanish came. In fact, Lamanai lasted right up into the 1900s until British sugar cane farmers drove the remaining inhabitants out to make way for their farms.
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