Mexico City suburb residents concerned after spending more than a month in black sewage

CHALCO, Mexico (AP) — Juana Salazar Segundo, 56, walked around her home in Chalco, a poor neighborhood southeast of Mexico City, and recalled how black, stinking water rose up to her navel after flooding early last month.

With the backflow reaching her ankles, Salazar staggered into a bedroom bare of furniture, a water pump humming in the corner. Large black stains appeared on the once-white walls.

For more than a month, floodwaters have been inundating streets, homes and businesses in the Culturas district of Chalco, where Salazar lives, flooded with sewage.

The low-lying area on the edge of an ancient lake has long struggled with seasonal flooding, but residents say it is worse this year, caused by a combination of uncontrolled economic growth and neglected infrastructure.

According to the Chalco government, more than 2,000 homes and more than 7,000 residents were affected. Water was 5 feet (160 centimeters) deep in some areas.

For the past few weeks, Salazar has been using four pumps running 24 hours a day to purify water from her home. Her arms and legs are streaked with black and gray from contact with contaminated floodwater.

“We couldn’t sleep day or night, the water level was constantly rising,” he says.

“I’ve been saying for years that the sewage system is broken,” Salazar said. “I couldn’t work because I had to take care of my stuff, my daughter couldn’t take her son to school… we just survived.”

Omar Arellano-Aguilar, a biologist and expert in environmental toxicology at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, said a combination of damaged drainage systems and the area’s geology make it more prone to flooding.

“All these urban areas have grown in a chaotic way over the last 50 years,” he said.

Chalco, a city of more than 400,000 inhabitants, has grown since the late 1980s to become one of the largest cities in the state of Mexico, but still lacks basic water and energy infrastructure.

Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has downplayed the crisis in Chalco and said he has no intention of visiting the disaster zone.

“It’s being taken care of,” he said during one of his daily press briefings last month. “It’s the same reason I didn’t go to Acapulco,” referring to the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Otis, which has killed at least 48 people. “It’s like vulture season,” he said, referring to press who asked him about it.

State Gov. Delfina Gómez has visited the district several times. The governor and the Chalco government did not respond to interview requests from The Associated Press.

Local, state and federal officials were working in the area, using powerful pumps to drain water, vaccinate residents and provide drinking water.

The sun beat down on the area behind Salazar’s house, and the sour stench of sewage and sludge wafted for miles.

A block away, 49-year-old Oscar Martínez Hinojosa was repairing a hose on one of his water pumps.

Martínez said that when the flooding began, the government did not give them any shoes or protective clothing. “They gave us nothing, no food, not a single pair of overalls … and we asked for them,” he said.

Martínez lives with five family members crammed into a top-floor room, where there is no damage. Downstairs, the courtyard and other bedrooms are flooded with ankle-deep water.

Another resident, Guadalupe Sarai Islas García, 32, said the sewage was causing many health problems. Her child was vomiting and had diarrhea for more than a week as the flooding continued.

“None of the politicians know what it’s like to live like this,” she said. “They can go home, take a shower, eat dinner in peace and sleep without a care in the world.”

Since her home was flooded a few weeks ago, she sent her children to her mother’s so they wouldn’t be exposed to more filth. Other residents have taken similar precautions and even started renting rooms in neighboring Ciudad Nezahualcóyotl.

However, dozens of state and local government trucks lined up on Chalco’s main street and pumped tons of water out of the area, helping to reduce water consumption.

Residents who managed to lower the water level are now removing garbage and silt from their homes.

Last weekend, authorities said there were no more flooded streets and that 245 tons of silt had been removed. More than 264 million gallons (1 million cubic meters) of water had also been extracted. Cleanup and disinfection of 28 streets affected by flooding had also begun.

At an elementary school located at a major intersection, principal Maria Luisa Molina Avila said she was optimistic about recent renovations that were carried out on the school grounds after flooding. The flooding delayed the start of the school year by two weeks for thousands of students.

“It was a rollercoaster, but thankfully a lot of the streets are dry now,” she said. She, her daughter and son drained, swept and cleaned the school to prepare it for the arrival of students.

“It’s a relief for the kids who are going back to school,” said resident García. “Now that our stress levels are at an all-time high.”

Back in the city, Salazar headed to a street corner with her dog, “Oso,” or “bear,” to attend a neighborhood meeting. She gathered with others to wait for more information about the construction of a drainage pipe that was scheduled to begin that morning.

As afternoon rain began to fall, a crowd of residents grew frustrated with construction officials. “Where is the solution to this problem?” one person asked. “We want you to start working! Look, it’s raining already,” another shouted.

Standing patiently at the edge of the Oso crowd, Salazar watched the scene in silence. Like many of her neighbors, she is patient, waiting for a resolution.

But Arellano-Aguilar doubted that retroactive fixes would work in the steadily sinking terrain. “Despite all the pipes they add, nothing will change,” he said. “In fact, all the infrastructure that is being installed now will suffer from subsidence.”

Arellano-Aguilar said that in addition to investing in more efficient drainage systems, stakeholders need to think about areas in the watershed where they can redirect stormwater.

“We have to learn to live near water and accept that there are areas that need to be flooded,” he said.