Flood Update: March 4th

An email which arrived this afternoon via a contact in Canada who is in touch with the community in Pisac:

We just spoke to our compadre Rene  in Peru – he was in his home in Pisac, and is returning to Cusco to join the rest of his family and Winay Taki this afternoon.   There was a terrible tragedy in Pisac yesterday.   People were working on the water channel up by the ruins late in the day, when there was a rush of water that came down with a rockslide.  Those who were working there were the poorest people from the communities, on a make-work project funded by the government.  Many women died.  Rene himself saw four corpses. In total 17 people died in Pisac.  Some of the survivors’ families came to him to ask if Winay Taki could play music at their internment of their relatives. The situation is very dangerous now – rocks are falling off the hillsides, the road pavement is broken up by slides and mud, and to reach Pisac you have to go via Urubamba, a much longer journey than the usual route to Cusco.  Six people in one of the communities on the road to Pisac died from a mud slide.   The rest of Winay Taki are in Cusco.  Many people are facing bare survival.  Rene said that there is much corruption in the government and funds are not finding their way to those most in need.  

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On Mar 04 in Peru tagged by kate