World Vision Relief Supplies En Route to Desperate Quake Survivors in Pakistan
APRO Communications Director James East reports from Pakistan on World Vision's relief efforts.
Islamabad, Pakistan (PRWEB) October 12, 2005 -- Aid trucks departed from World Vision Pakistan's operations base in the capital Islamabad and from Lahore, this morning (Tuesday), loaded with 1,000 blankets, 1,000 tents, 1,000 cases of 12 x 1 litre water bottles and 2,000 burial cloths for Mansehra in North West Frontier Province, which observers say appears to have been 'carpet bombed'.
World Vision relief workers will offload the goods in Mansehra onto smaller trucks to be transported to villages that have been decimated by the quake. Pakistan continues to be gripped by fear and shock as the extent of the devastation unfolds, with the UN reporting more than 120,000 people are desperate for shelter and up to four million people could be left homeless.
"My staff, who have been out in the field, said as the bodies keep coming in most of them are children. It is heartrending. People are talking about a lost generation. I can't imagine how the children who survived are coping," said World Vision Pakistan National Director Sigurd Hanson. "My neighour's driver told me that his whole clan had died. He was leaving for Karachi in the far south because he was so terrified of what he had experienced. We are now talking about the formation of camps for Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) to cope with people like this who are fleeing the quake area," added Hanson.
Speaking from Mansehra, three hours drive north of Islamabad, World Vision Pakistan Programme Officer Fayyaz Gill said he had seen many injured people on his way up to the town where World Vision is trucking in aid. Villagers were being treated by medical teams on the roadside. Private cars and trucks were also pouring into the region that has so far received little assistance.
"There are a lot of terrible things here. People are receiving aid beside the roads and at the hospitals. Straw and mud homes have collapsed," said Fayyaz.
Fayyaz reported that on the outskirts of Mansehra, 60-70 percent of the straw and mud brick homes had collapsed. In Abbotabad, on the way up to Mansehra, he said he had seen terrified villagers migrating into the cities with their goats. Their homes had been destroyed and they were trying to find aid.
Ijaz Ahmad, Human Resources Manager, who assessed the needs for Mansehra town and district on Sunday returned yesterday (Monday) with horror stories of what he had seen: "I went from Mansehra to Balakot. Vehicles were carrying the dead and the wounded. The health facilities are completely destroyed. The homes on the mountains were completely washed away. Community workers told me that hundreds of children are in the debris and most are thought to have died. The government does not have the equipment, or if it does have it, it is not possible to get it through to the mountains. The water and sanitation system has been completely destroyed. The river waters are dirty from mud and this is now undrinkable. The tap water system has been destroyed. Electricity was down and it is becoming cold at night and people are sleeping outside. Women, who culturally would usually be indoors, were sitting outside. These women have no homes. I saw many girls walking and crying."
Ahmad implored, "You have to help the children. This is a real emergency. Proper coordination is needed and things need to be transparent, so the local government and local NGOs should be involved. They have the capacity and outreach and they know which areas are most impacted. For example, one local NGO that World Vision is working with has 1,400 community groups of 35 people each, totaling some 49,000 people. This is a massive network. We are working with several local groups like this."
World Vision assessment teams have returned from Mansehra district and further north in Shangla and Kohistan districts. Relief supplies will soon flow into these areas. "We are moving as quickly as possible to get things out to the people who need it. The conditions out there are horrendous, the roads into the remote areas are broken and closed. We are doing all that we can to speed the aid to the areas that we have assessed. We also have aid coming in today by plane from overseas," said Sigurd Hanson.
Aid agencies, government officials and the military are only beginning to reach some of the worst affected and remoter areas. With emergency aid still to reach outlying areas due to a shortage of helicopters and because roads remain blocked or fractured, villagers have been left to tear through collapsed buildings with their bare hands in the hope of finding lost children and family members. Roads into some of the larger settlements and towns have opened allowing heavy equipment to flow in.
Rescue workers continue to search schools where hundreds of children are thought to have perished. In Balakot, nearly 1,000 students are thought to have been buried when two schools and a madrassah (religious school) collapsed. Dozens are still being rescued three days after Saturday's quake.
Across the quake affected area of the North West Frontier Province and Kashmir cries for help can still be heard coming from beneath piles of rubble. But without heavy lifting and earth moving gear, there is little chance these people will be saved in the remoter areas. In Islamabad, which as been relatively unscathed, many slept in the open on Monday night as aftershocks continue to rock the area.
James is actually (on his way) to/in Mansehra Steve Matthews and John Schenk arriving 12 October in Islamabad.
Contact:
Dean R. Owen
(253) 815-2103
www.worldvision.org
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