Panic, Looting And Triage After Major Haiti Quake

The tiny bodies of children lay in piles next to the ruins of their collapsed school. People with faces covered by white dust and the blood or open wounds Roamed The Streets. Frantic doctors stitched up wrapped heads and limbs sliced in a hotel parking lot.

The poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, still struggling to recover from the relentless strikes of four catastrophic storms in 2008, was a picture of heartbreaking devastation Wednesday after a magnitude-7 earthquake.

Tuesday's quake left a landscape of collapsed buildings — hospitals, schools, churches, ramshackle homes, even the gleaming national palace — the rubble sending up a white cloud that shrouded the entire capital.

On Wednesday, ambulances weaved in and out of crowds, swerving to miss the bodies lying in street and the men on foot who lugged stretchers bearing some of the injured.

Shocked survivors wandered about in a daze, some wailing the names of loved ones, praying or calling for help. Others with injuries fast growing into infections sat by the roadside, waiting for doctors who were not sure to come.

Search-and-rescue helicopters buzzed over the bodies of partially clothed victims who lay face-down in mounds of rubble and twisted steel.

Everywhere, there was panic, urgency, pleas for help.

"Thousands of people poured out into the streets, crying, carrying bloody bodies, looking for anyone who could help them," Bob Poff, divisional director of disaster services in Haiti for the Salvation Army, said in a posting on the agency's Web site.

Poff wrote that he was driving down the mountain from Petionville, a hillside city bordering the capital, when the earthquake struck.

"Our truck was being tossed to and fro like a toy, and when it stopped, I looked out the windows to see buildings 'pancaking' down," he wrote.

Poff said he and others piled bodies into the back of his truck and took them down the hill, hoping to get them medical attention.

There was no reliable count, but officials feared thousands, maybe tens of thousands, had died in the quake. Some Haitian leaders suggested the figure could be higher than 100,000. In the chaos, doctors rushed to tend to the countless injured.

The parking lot of Port-au-Prince's Hotel Villa Creole became a triage center. Under tents fashioned from bloody sheets, dozens lay moaning from the pain of cuts in their heads, broken bones and crushed ribs.

"I can't take it any more. My back hurts too much," said Alex Georges, 28, who had lain on the parking lot's sloping blacktop for more than a day waiting for help. Just a few feet away lay the dead body of another man who appeared to be about his age.

When the quake struck just before 5 p.m. Tuesday, Georges he was in a meeting with about 30 other students at a school in the neighborhood of Morne Hercule. The roof fell in, he said, killing 11 of his classmates instantly and critically injuring him and others.

Several thousand Haitian police and international peacekeepers poured into the streets Wednesday to clear debris, direct traffic and maintain security. But there was only so much they could do: Looters prowled through shops, then blended into crowds of desperate refugees lugging salvaged possessions. The main prison in the capital fell, and there were reports of escaped inmates, U.N. humanitarian spokeswoman Elisabeth Byrs said in Geneva.

Haitians who could still walk were streaming out of the capital by the hundreds, many of them balancing suitcases and other belongings on their heads as they headed down one of the capital's main streets. Police shouted orders to keep traffic moving at congested intersections as ambulances and United Nations trucks raced toward downtown Port-au-Prince.

In Petionville, people used sledgehammers and their bare hands to excavate a collapsed commercial center, scampering across the rubble as they tossed aside mattresses and office supplies. More than a dozen cars and a U.N. truck were buried underneath.

Up the hill, about 200 victims, including many small children, huddled together in a theater parking lot and rigged tarps out of bed sheets to protect themselves from the scorching sun.

"The immediate need is to rescue people trapped in the rubble, then to get people food and water," Sophie Perez, Haiti director of the US-based humanitarian organization CARE, told her colleagues in an e-mail.

"Everything is urgent."

Haiti Earthquake Strongest in 200 Years

The magnitude 7 earthquake that struck Haiti yesterday, the strongest earthquake to hit the region in more than two centuries, geologists say.


HAITI EARTHQUAKE PHOTO

* Devastation on the day after
* Aerial photographs of earthquake damage

Although earthquakes are not rare in the Caribbean island country, the intensity of the recent earthquake surprised Haiti experts.

"It is very strange" from a historical perspective, "said Julie Detton, a geophysicist with the U.S. Geological Survey.

Haiti is a part of the island of Hispaniola, which also hosts the Dominican Republic. The last major earthquake to strike Haiti side of the island in 1860.

Initial earthquake yesterday, which beaten to approximately 5 hours local time yesterday, led to dozens of aftershocks, of which about 15 magnitude 5 or greater.

Earthquake or other major earthquakes could cause is not known.

"It is not something that we can project happen," said Detton.

"But certainly when you moving two [records] in one area, you are building stress and tension in another."

(See also "Haiti Earthquake, Landslide Deforestation Heighten Risk.")

Earthquake Haiti: Seismic Stresses

Haiti The earthquake was caused by the release of seismic stresses that had built up around two tectonic plates.

The movements of these plates are called strike-slip faults, where two parts of the crust of the earth are grinding past each other in opposite direction.

"The Caribbean plate to the east on the North American plate," said Detton.

When the tension along the fault lines reach a certain point, they can be released in bursts of energy that cause earthquakes, although it is unclear where the energy will be discharged as a series of small tremors or if a big temblor.

Since Haiti is very close to the border where the Caribbean and North American plates meet, fracture lines in relation to the movements of the plates' run across the country, Detton said.

In fact, the epicenter of the quake was about 10 miles (16 kilometer) southwest of capital city of Haiti, Port-au-Prince. (See a map Haiti.)

Haiti is also the earthquake was very shallow, which centered only 6.2 miles (10 kilometer) below the surface of the earth.

This put impoverished Port-au-Prince near the most intense shaking, which contributes to the level of destruction: Thousands are feared dead and many buildings have collapsed, schools and hotels to the Haitian Parliament and the local UN headquarters.

The American Red Cross estimates that the earthquake Haiti have some three million people in total.

WHO spearheads health response to earthquake in Haiti

The severe earthquake that struck Haiti and the Dominican Republic has inflicted large-scale damage, including on hospitals and health facilities, and large numbers of casualties are feared.

Immediate health priorities include:
search and rescue of survivors trapped underneath rubble;
treatment of people with major trauma injuries;
preventing the infection of wounds;
provision of clean water and sanitation; and
ensuring breast-feeding is continued.

Control of communicable diseases, such as diarrhoeal diseases and respiratory infections, will be another major concern in coming days.

WHO is working with local authorities, United Nations agencies and humanitarian partners to respond to the emergency. More specifically, WHO is supporting the Haitian government to best coordinate international health assistance to the country. WHO is also collecting data on the health impact of the earthquake to disseminate to other humanitarian aid providers.

In addition, WHO is deploying a 12-member team of health and logistics experts. The WHO experts being sent include specialists in mass casualty management, coordination of emergency health response and the management of dead bodies.

UN buildings, including the WHO premises, have suffered damage in the magnitude 7.0 earthquake, which struck on 12 January. The main force of the earthquake was felt 17 kilometres south-west of the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince.

Haiti is a country that has already suffered from years of humanitarian crisis and natural disasters, including a series of hurricanes that battered the country in 2008.

For more information, please contact:
Paul Garwood
Communications Officer
Health Action in Crises
World Health Organization
Telephone: +41 22 791 3462
E-mail: garwoodp@who.int

Earthquake hits Haiti "Serious loss of life" expected

A major earthquake struck southern Haiti on Tuesday, knocking down buildings and power lines and inflicting what its ambassador to the United States called a catastrophe for the Western Hemisphere's poorest nation.

"I can do is pray and hope that only the best" ambassador, Raymond Joseph Alcide, CNN is told.

Pictures of the collapse of Haiti show on CNN's iReport is sent to homes and small businesses.

Are you there? IReport submission

7.0 magnitude quake - Haiti affected in the most powerful of the Century - 5 am just before 10 miles (15 ㎞) southwest of Port-au-Prince was the center, United States Geological Survey report. It is powerful eastern Cuba could be felt 200 miles away witnesses said.
Video Destruction of Haiti
Video: Witness Describes severe knocks "
Video: "I felt the house shake
Interactive: Measuring Earthquakes
Interactive: Map of Haiti



Haiti experts and earthquake risk

Mike Godfrey, U.S. agent for the United States and international organizations working for development, "a huge column of dust and smoke over the city," an earthquake has risen to the minute - "completely covered with a blanket, and forging of the town about 20 minutes.

Witnesses and the residence of the president and the nearby homes, including three centuries of capital by the damaged buildings and hospitals collapsed in the AP reports. President René Préval, Joseph said, but the safety of the dead and wounded on Tuesday completely expected.

Official home of the government, "the right side of the street on the left side of the street and say, yes," he said.

"He is a great size angyida disasters," said Joseph.

Impact your World: How to help

Frank Williams, director of the Haitian Relief Agency World Vision International Earthquake "pretty much screams" People around Port-au-Prince is alive. Building from the agency about 35 seconds, "shaking off some of the stuff in the building," he said.

Our staff, "no one was hurt, but many walls are," said Williams. "Most of our employees to leave, because the buildings are in the street walls and a private house was a failure, so it's pretty much the most significant efforts of the traffic was blocked."

Read through social media in Haiti what people say

Government of Haiti by the United Nations peacekeeping forces ousted former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, in 2004 and is supported by the establishment since.

UN peacekeeping mission headquarters in Port-au-Prince, UN officials told CNN in an interview that was destroyed.

A large number of personnel still unaccounted for if the building is death, or immediate reports of injuries, but Alain Le Roy, Vice President for the 9000 Brazilian-led peacekeeping mission members, the Force, "For a moment can have."

Outside the capital, Cayes many people in the southwestern city of Les hurried to the school, were wounded Rev. Kesner Ajax, is director of the school. The collapse of the two houses and churches in the area at the top of the village, he said, but he was not dead.

Les Cayes, about 400,000 people in about 140 miles (225 km) southwest of Port-au-Prince is one.

Earthquake) underground, according to Geological Survey of about 6 miles (10 kilometers happens - it can produce severe vibrations in the depths. At least 10 aftershocks, including two Level 5 range, followed by the USGS reported.



Haiti aid appeal after the earthquake hits

Jean Bernard, a witness in Port-au-Prince, said the city had no electricity Tuesday evening. Said the first bucket Earthquake 35-40 seconds.

"The house a lot [and] the building down, and people are still out on the streets," said Bernard. "People for their wives, their husbands and their children looking to find. It's very scary."

Luke Renner of the total stay in the United States - Hatien, his home, he "began to shake the whole world was about 100 miles north of the city to the Port-au-Prince said."

"It felt like our whole house had to balance a ball on the beach" reneohaetda. "Our society is full of screams and distortion of the entire 20 to 30 seconds to close the window."

"I've seen here have no structural damage," reneohaetda. "The sun can be difficult to set up this morning. We will definitely know."

Also because of the proximity of the earthquake and it is a densely populated urban poor housing is built, "it could lead to serious accidents," Jian Lin, Massachusetts, a senior geologist at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute obey.

President Obama in Washington with the U.S. government "help people in Haiti are ready." Humanitarian aid sent from the U. S. Ministry of Defense is preparing, but not sure how or where it has not been sent. Airlines American source-port-au-Prince International Airport control tower, perhaps efforts to fly relief supplies to intervene in the country collapsed.

State and Hillary Clinton in Washington, "Our full support" was provided to Haiti. "

Haiti, David Lind Wall Deputy Head of Mission in the United States, that he "Earthquake damage to U.S. officials saw" a serious loss of life expectancy, said Clinton, "said Crowley.

And man Clinton, former President Bill Clinton - UN Special Envoy for Haiti now - what on earth and our bodies in their relief and rehabilitation efforts to help rebuild the Haitian people doing the best I can, "he said. "

Especially in the United States of Haiti's commercial, political, military and most of the last century. Under President Clinton the power of intervention in the United States 1994, Aristide after a coup in 1991, and U.S. fighter jets him back to his country in 2004 against the government of fraud is spreading rapidly restored after elevation.

Disasters happen to the old country is about 9 million, the estimated size of Maryland. It is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere and is one of the poorest countries in the world.

People and fuel wood strip farming, mountainous countryside to the country is clearly highly deforested. This is a serious erosion, and large-scale vulnerable to heavy rains landslides are on the left Haiti said.

Hurricane Georges in 1998, while more than 400 deaths and destroyed most crops in the country of Hurricane Gordon in 1994 killed more than 1,000. And Hurricane Frances in the 2004 and more than 3,000 people north of Haiti through the northwestern city of Gonaives was slain, most of the dead.

Bad weather in Gonaives 2008 when 10 4 to the system was right.

Moreover child-tier schools in November 2008, the collapse of more than 90 people were slain and 150 wounded - Disaster officials blame poor design.

passed through.

In addition, a Haitian school collapsed in November 2008, killing more than 90 people and injuring 150 -- a disaster authorities blamed on poor construction.

Eighty percent of Haiti's population lives under the poverty line, according to the CIA World Factbook.