Léogâne

Léogâne

Aerial view of earthquake damage in Léogâne

The port city of Léogâne ( kreyòl : Leyogàn ) is located 30 km west of the capital Port-au-Prince on the north coast of the Tiburon peninsula in the Ouest department of Haiti . Léogâne is the capital of the arrondissement of the same name .

In 2009, before the earthquake in January 2010 (see below), over 200,000 people lived there. In the meantime, the city has largely been rebuilt, not least thanks to donations from Europe; At first glance, there is not much left of the material damage caused by the earthquake.

history

The large settlement of Xaragua, located in the area of ​​today's Léogâne, was the capital of a lost Taíno empire under King Caonabo. He was followed as ruler by his wife Anacaona, who was also born there .

Léogâne in the time of the French colony and the republic

In 1710 the parish of Léogâne was established. It is one of the oldest in all of Hispaniola , an indication of the importance of the city at that time. In the course of the fighting triggered by the Haitian Revolution , Léogâne was temporarily occupied by British troops in 1794, which were, however, driven out after a short time by a French army led by the mulatto André Rigaud .

In 1865, just five years after the concordat of 1860 paved the way for this, the new parish church of Sainte Rose de Lima was built in the French style , at that time one of the largest in the country.

Charlemagne Péralte , a former officer, started his movement against the US occupation of his country from here in 1915.

The earthquake on January 12, 2010

Léogâne was close to the epicenter of the earthquake on January 12, 2010 with a magnitude of 7.0 on the Richter scale . Initial estimates of the death toll were between 5,000 and 10,000. To this day this has not been clarified, as many residents buried their relatives on their own property. A UN investigation team found that Léogâne, which was 80–90% destroyed - even before Port-au-Prince - was the most affected city. Were destroyed u. a. the large main Catholic parish church of Sainte Rose de Lima in the city center as well as the nearby high school of the same name, Sainte Rose de Lima .

climate

Léogâne
Climate diagram
J F. M. A. M. J J A. S. O N D.     33   27 22nd     33   27 22nd     56   27 22nd     74   27 23     96   28 24     79   29 25th     70   30th 25th     92   30th 25th     105   29 25th     124   28 25th     77   28 24     41   27 23 Temperature in ° C ,  precipitation in mm Source:

Average monthly temperatures and rainfall for Léogâne Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Max. Temperature ( ° C ) 27 27 27 27 28 29 30th 30th 29 28 28 27 O 28.1 Min. Temperature (° C) 22nd 22nd 22nd 23 24 25th 25th 25th 25th 25th 24 23 O 23.8 Temperature (° C) 24.5 24.5 24.5 25.0 26.0 27.0 27.5 27.5 27.0 26.5 26.0 25.0 O 25.9 Precipitation ( mm ) 33 33 56 74 96 79 70 92 105 124 77 41 Σ 880 Hours of sunshine ( h / d ) 8.8 9.0 8.9 8.5 8.1 8.2 8.7 8.6 7.8 7.5 8.1 8.3 O 8.4 Rainy days ( d ) 23 22nd 27 28 29 28 28 28 29 30th 27 24 Σ 323 Source:

Individual evidence

1. ^ Jacques de Cauna: Haiti, l'éternelle révolution. Histoire d'une décolonisation (1789–1804) . Éditions Pyremonde, Monein 2009. ISBN 978-2-914067-64-5 . P. 20.
2. ^ Paroisses Catholiques d'Haïti, accessed on November 26, 2014
3. ^ John Relly Beard: The life of Toussaint L'Ouverture, the negro patriot of Haytí. Comprising an account of the struggle for liberty in the island, and a sketch of its history to the present period . Ingram, Cooke, and Co., London 1853, p. 87 ( digitized version ).
4. ^ Article in Le Parisien from January 16, 2010 (French).
5. ↑ Scott Wilson: In Leogane, Haiti, rebuilding starts with scavenging . In: Washington Post , January 19, 2010. Retrieved January 26, 2010. 
6. ↑ Climate table on wetter24.de

Web links

• The Louverture Project Wiki

Coordinates: 18 ° 31 ′  N , 72 ° 38 ′  W