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The smoke is still clearing from Tuesday night’s deadly prison fire.  By early Wednesday morning, reports of at least 275 dead were circulating.  One of our staff members, R., was outside the prison, trying to get news about his uncle.

It was while R. was there that the crowd, waiting for news of their incarcerated loved ones, got out of hand.  They began to riot and demand answers.  They demanded to see the bodies, to know for sure that their family members were or were not dead.  They stormed the outer gates of the prison.  They threw rocks at the police and soldiers who were there.

The police responded in kind: by shooting their weapons into the air, over the heads of the people and by releasing tear gas.  All this was in the morning, while we were starting our first day of school.  Even several hours later, as the wind blew in our direction, my eyes were just a bit irritated by the tear gas.  Several teachers mentioned the same thing to me.

I spent some time on Wednesday afternoon and early evening watching the news.  Now, if you’ve never watched Honduran news, it’s definitely a different experience than watching news in the States: no detail is spared from view.  If a bloody body can be seen, you can bet that they will show it on camera.  Again.  And again. And again.

When I turned on the news, I happened upon scenes of workers carrying body bags to a waiting 18-wheel container and loading them in, stacking them as high as they could.  Other reports said that many of the bodies have been so badly burned that they are fused together with other bodies.  Or, when the workers try to pick up a body, they are basically like charcoal and disintegrate in their hands.  And still, family members are waiting for word on their loved ones.

Yes, many of the prisoners were drug dealers, gang members, murderers, rapists, and thieves.  Others were waiting for their trials, which can take years to get to.  Regardless of the crimes they were in for, these men were human beings.  They were someone’s son, brother, husband, father.  Unlike the comments I’ve been reading on some of the news sites, they didn’t deserve to die this way.  No one deserves to dies in such a horrific manner.  The world is not better off without them.  I guess it’s easy for some to dismiss mercy and compassion when the victims live in a Third World nation.

May God comfort the families and all those who mourn these losses.  May He bring peace and hope to people who have none.

Here are some photos I took from the second floor of one of our buildings.

To put this in perspective, the black tower in the foreground is on our property. The greenhouses are toward the edge of the prison property and the row of people and structures across the middle of the picture are at the prison.

You can see a journalist standing on top of a structure to get a better view.  Also, there are two streams of water being used, probably to put out hot spots.

The man with the orange cart was headed to the prison to try to earn a few Lempiras.

You can see a wall of blue as the police form a line against family members wanting news of their loved ones.

For more photos, you can follow this link to a  Yahoo News photo story from inside the prison grounds.

In my next post, I'll tell you about some of the people, some of my friends, who lost family members in this fire.