Haití
En la lengua de los taínos, los primitivos pobladores de las Antillas, la isla que los conquistadores denominaron Hispaniola y, más tarde, Santo Domingo, se llamaba Ayití, que significaba 'tierra de las altas montañas', o también 'la montaña sobre el mar'.
En el siglo XVII, cuando los franceses provenientes de la isla Tortuga ocuparon la parte occidental de la Hispaniola, afrancesaron el nombre de Santo Domingo a Saint-Domingue, denominación que quedó consagrada por los tratados de Rickswick (1697) y de Basilea (1795) para designar a la parte occidental de la isla, que en aquella época tenía el sobrenombre de "perla de las Antillas".
Haití se llamó así Saint-Domingue hasta su independencia, el 1º de enero de 1804, cuando el líder de la revuelta de los esclavos, Jean-Jacques Dessalines, tras tomar el poder, le reimpuso el nombre taíno, afrancesado a la forma Haïti, con diéresis sobre la i. El mismo día Dessalines, tal vez como un desafío al poder de Napoleón, se proclamó emperador del nuevo país y gobernó como tal hasta 1806, cuando murió asesinado.
Haití es hoy el país más pobre de América y uno de los más pobres del mundo. La tragedia que castiga hoy a la isla debe ser oída como un llamado a la solidaridad de todos los hombres y mujeres del mundo.
53 Haitian Orphans Are Airlifted to U.S.
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By JAMES C. McKINLEY Jr. and SEAN D. HAMILL
Published: January 19, 2010
MIAMI — A group of 53 Haitian orphans landed in Pittsburgh on Tuesday morning, the first wave to arrive after the United States loosened its policy on visa requirements to expedite Americans' adoptions of parentless children living in the post-earthquake ruins.
Enlarge This Image
Gene J. Puskar/Associated Press
The first wave of Haitian orphans, 53 whose orphanage was destroyed in the earthquake, arrived Tuesday in Pittsburgh.
Multimedia
Interactive Feature
Perspectives on Haiti's Earthquake
Interactive Feature
Haiti Earthquake Multimedia
Related
U.S. Troops Patrol Haiti, Filling a Void (January 20, 2010)
U.S. Marines Land in Villages on the Edge (January 20, 2010)
But the new policy, announced late Monday, affects only 900 children whom the Haitian government had already identified as orphans, and whom adoption agencies had matched with couples in the United States.
Tens of thousands of children are believed to have been orphaned in the quake, and their fate remains unclear, aid groups and United Nations officials say.
Catholic leaders in Miami are pushing both governments to have children who appear to be orphaned airlifted to temporary group homes in South Florida. Several aid groups who focus on children, however, say every effort should be made to reunite them with relatives.
It normally takes three years to adopt a child from Haiti, because of a lengthy process required under Haitian law. The Haitian government has had reason to be cautious; there are about 200 orphanages in Haiti, but United Nations officials say not all are legitimate. Some are fronts for traffickers who buy children from their parents and sell them to couples in other countries. "In orphanages in Haiti there are an awful lot of children who are not orphans," said Christopher de Bono, a Unicef spokesman.
Under the new policy, announced Monday night by the Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, the United States is waiving visa requirements on humanitarian grounds for Haitian children already in the pipeline for adoption. Some adoptions had already been approved by Haitian authorities, but the United States also agreed to let in other children who had been matched with American parents but had not gotten a final blessing from Haitian officials.
"The U.S. government has never done this in the past," said Mary F. Robinson, president of the National Council for Adoption. "They are really going all out to expedite the process."
Homeland Security Department officials said they were walking a fine line, trying to let in bona fide orphans without opening the floodgates to all children who have been separated from their parents.
"We remain focused on family unification and must be vigilant not to separate children from relatives in Haiti who are still alive but displaced, or to unknowingly assist criminals who traffic in children in such desperate times," said Matthew Chandler, a spokesman for the department.
Gov. Edward G. Rendell of Pennsylvania played an instrumental role in bringing the first planeload of children out of Haiti, and the bureaucratic difficulties his team faced underscore the legal and moral complexities of transferring hundreds of children to a new country in the middle of a catastrophe that has crippled the Haitian government.
"There were many times we thought we were coming back with no one," Mr. Rendell said Tuesday in Pittsburgh.
After an all-night journey on two planes, the children — some wrapped in blankets, some carried by nurses and doctors, some walking and waving — came off a donated jet at Pittsburgh International Airport just after 9 a.m. and were taken by bus to the Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh of U.P.M.C. with a police escort.
Some of their adoptive parents waited anxiously while doctors examined the children, most of whom are under the age of 4.
"We just kept expecting the worst-case scenario, that they wouldn't survive, that they'd be looted, that they'd run out of water," said Jill Lear of Watertown, S.D., who arrived with her husband, Bruce, to wait for two children they were to adopt.
Mr. Rendell and Representative Jason Altmire flew Monday to Haiti on a chartered plane carrying medical supplies and 20 doctors and nurses. The plan was to drop off the supplies and pick up children from an orphanage run by two sisters, Jamie and Alison McMutrie from a Pittsburgh suburb, Ben Avon, Pa..
The orphanage was so badly damaged that the McMutrie sisters and the children were living in a courtyard. With a borrowed cellphone, they sent out appeals for help, saying they had only enough provisions for a few days.
Having lobbied the White House for several days, the Pennsylvania delegation had obtained United States visas for the children and had expected to be on the ground one hour.
But Haitian officials would let only 28 of the 54 orphans the sisters had brought to the airport to leave; the rest had not cleared all the hurdles for adoption. Seven had yet to be matched with adoptive parents, the Haitians said.
Then the sisters dug in their heels. "They just said no, they wouldn't leave without all of them," Mr. Altmire said.
For five hours, the delegation worked furiously to get the Haitian government to agree to let all the children go. The governor's wife, Judge Marjorie O. Rendell of the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, went to Port-au-Prince to meet with American diplomats. Mr. Rendell and Mr. Altmire lobbied the White House, which pressured Haitian officials.
The chartered plane was forced to return to Miami before a deal was reached, Mr. Rendell said, but the delegation stayed in Haiti. But at 11 p.m., the Haitian officials relented and the children were evacuated on a United States military cargo plane to Orlando, Fla., where they transferred to the jet to Pennsylvania. One child was found to be missing at the last minute in Haiti, and Jamie McMutrie stayed behind to find her. They were expected to arrive here Wednesday.
James C. McKinley Jr. reported from Miami, and Sean D. Hamill from Pittsburgh.
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By JAMES C. McKINLEY Jr. and SEAN D. HAMILL
Published: January 19, 2010
MIAMI — A group of 53 Haitian orphans landed in Pittsburgh on Tuesday morning, the first wave to arrive after the United States loosened its policy on visa requirements to expedite Americans' adoptions of parentless children living in the post-earthquake ruins.
Enlarge This Image
Gene J. Puskar/Associated Press
The first wave of Haitian orphans, 53 whose orphanage was destroyed in the earthquake, arrived Tuesday in Pittsburgh.
Multimedia
Interactive Feature
Perspectives on Haiti's Earthquake
Interactive Feature
Haiti Earthquake Multimedia
Related
U.S. Troops Patrol Haiti, Filling a Void (January 20, 2010)
U.S. Marines Land in Villages on the Edge (January 20, 2010)
But the new policy, announced late Monday, affects only 900 children whom the Haitian government had already identified as orphans, and whom adoption agencies had matched with couples in the United States.
Tens of thousands of children are believed to have been orphaned in the quake, and their fate remains unclear, aid groups and United Nations officials say.
Catholic leaders in Miami are pushing both governments to have children who appear to be orphaned airlifted to temporary group homes in South Florida. Several aid groups who focus on children, however, say every effort should be made to reunite them with relatives.
It normally takes three years to adopt a child from Haiti, because of a lengthy process required under Haitian law. The Haitian government has had reason to be cautious; there are about 200 orphanages in Haiti, but United Nations officials say not all are legitimate. Some are fronts for traffickers who buy children from their parents and sell them to couples in other countries. "In orphanages in Haiti there are an awful lot of children who are not orphans," said Christopher de Bono, a Unicef spokesman.
Under the new policy, announced Monday night by the Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, the United States is waiving visa requirements on humanitarian grounds for Haitian children already in the pipeline for adoption. Some adoptions had already been approved by Haitian authorities, but the United States also agreed to let in other children who had been matched with American parents but had not gotten a final blessing from Haitian officials.
"The U.S. government has never done this in the past," said Mary F. Robinson, president of the National Council for Adoption. "They are really going all out to expedite the process."
Homeland Security Department officials said they were walking a fine line, trying to let in bona fide orphans without opening the floodgates to all children who have been separated from their parents.
"We remain focused on family unification and must be vigilant not to separate children from relatives in Haiti who are still alive but displaced, or to unknowingly assist criminals who traffic in children in such desperate times," said Matthew Chandler, a spokesman for the department.
Gov. Edward G. Rendell of Pennsylvania played an instrumental role in bringing the first planeload of children out of Haiti, and the bureaucratic difficulties his team faced underscore the legal and moral complexities of transferring hundreds of children to a new country in the middle of a catastrophe that has crippled the Haitian government.
"There were many times we thought we were coming back with no one," Mr. Rendell said Tuesday in Pittsburgh.
After an all-night journey on two planes, the children — some wrapped in blankets, some carried by nurses and doctors, some walking and waving — came off a donated jet at Pittsburgh International Airport just after 9 a.m. and were taken by bus to the Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh of U.P.M.C. with a police escort.
Some of their adoptive parents waited anxiously while doctors examined the children, most of whom are under the age of 4.
"We just kept expecting the worst-case scenario, that they wouldn't survive, that they'd be looted, that they'd run out of water," said Jill Lear of Watertown, S.D., who arrived with her husband, Bruce, to wait for two children they were to adopt.
Mr. Rendell and Representative Jason Altmire flew Monday to Haiti on a chartered plane carrying medical supplies and 20 doctors and nurses. The plan was to drop off the supplies and pick up children from an orphanage run by two sisters, Jamie and Alison McMutrie from a Pittsburgh suburb, Ben Avon, Pa..
The orphanage was so badly damaged that the McMutrie sisters and the children were living in a courtyard. With a borrowed cellphone, they sent out appeals for help, saying they had only enough provisions for a few days.
Having lobbied the White House for several days, the Pennsylvania delegation had obtained United States visas for the children and had expected to be on the ground one hour.
But Haitian officials would let only 28 of the 54 orphans the sisters had brought to the airport to leave; the rest had not cleared all the hurdles for adoption. Seven had yet to be matched with adoptive parents, the Haitians said.
Then the sisters dug in their heels. "They just said no, they wouldn't leave without all of them," Mr. Altmire said.
For five hours, the delegation worked furiously to get the Haitian government to agree to let all the children go. The governor's wife, Judge Marjorie O. Rendell of the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, went to Port-au-Prince to meet with American diplomats. Mr. Rendell and Mr. Altmire lobbied the White House, which pressured Haitian officials.
The chartered plane was forced to return to Miami before a deal was reached, Mr. Rendell said, but the delegation stayed in Haiti. But at 11 p.m., the Haitian officials relented and the children were evacuated on a United States military cargo plane to Orlando, Fla., where they transferred to the jet to Pennsylvania. One child was found to be missing at the last minute in Haiti, and Jamie McMutrie stayed behind to find her. They were expected to arrive here Wednesday.
James C. McKinley Jr. reported from Miami, and Sean D. Hamill from Pittsburgh.
U.S. Marines Land in Villages on the Edge
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By RAY RIVERA
Published: January 19, 2010
LÉOGÂNE, Haiti — The Marine helicopters began landing just before noon on Tuesday in a cow pasture here in this heavily damaged farming town about nine miles south of Port-au-Prince, kicking up strong winds and drawing crowds of the curious and hopeful.
Multimedia
Slide Show
U.S. Troops Step Up Haiti Role
Interactive Feature
Perspectives on Haiti's Earthquake
Interactive Feature
Haiti Earthquake Multimedia
Related
U.S. Troops Patrol Haiti, Filling a Void (January 20, 2010)
Tiny Steps Toward Basic Services (January 20, 2010)
53 Haitian Orphans Are Airlifted to U.S. (January 20, 2010)
Room for Debate: Is the U.S. Doing Enough for Haiti?
Haiti Disaster Relief: How to Contribute | Tips on Donating
About 125 Marines eventually landed here and planned to stay about 24 hours to unload initial shipments of water and food. They expected to spend the night camped out in the pasture.
The relief effort was the United States military's first significant mission outside Port-au-Prince, the devastated capital, where the needs remain daunting.
For some of the Marines, the work in Haiti is deeply personal.
Cpl. Clifford Sajous, 22, of Elmont, N.Y., grew up in Port-au-Prince, and some of his family, including his father, brother, a cousin and three young nephews, ages 10, 8 and 7, have been living in the city. None of them have been heard from.
Corporal Sajous, who is doubling as a translator on the mission here, said he has not let thoughts of his missing family members interfere with his work. But for the young corporal, who lived in Haiti until he was 13, the images he has seen on television while shipboard on the way from Norfolk have been wrenching.
"I really wanted to cry," he said, "because that's where I grew up. A lot of those places I recognize, and seeing all these people dead and people running out of food and water, that hurts me."
"Even here," he added, "we're going to hand out some water and food and not everyone is going to get some."
The Marines passed the food they brought to the United Nations, which sent it by truck to a nearby stadium to be distributed. Corporal Sajous and other company translators filtered into the crowd to explain where the aid was going. But the message wasn't getting out to everyone.
"Yes, they are going to give it to us," said Son Son Maurice, 25, as he stood waiting. Asked if he was sure, he said "Yes, I am sure."
The Marines did not leave the cow pasture on Tuesday, and what they witnessed of the damage in the area they saw from the sky as their helicopters flew in.
The devastation here is immense, but harder to see quickly here than in the city of Port-au-Prince, where toppled buildings line the streets. Here in Léogâne, buildings are scattered amid sugar cane fields and banana trees, but it is easier to count the structures still standing than those that have collapsed.
People here believe about 5,000 people died in the town.
If there was any symbolic significance to Marines landing here after past United States interventions in this troubled country, few here seemed to care. Some in the crowd even joked with the Marines who were standing guard with rifles slung over their shoulders.
"You know we are in a bad situation, so I am glad they came to help us," said Charlius Saint Louis, 45, who lost a 15-year-old daughter and 12-year-old son in the earthquake, as well as a girlfriend who was pregnant with his child.
On a drive to the town from Port-au-Prince, damage could be seen all along the route. Long fissures lined the two-lane paved road. One of the lanes was covered in many sections by boulders and soil from landslides.
At a village called Mona Bateau about two miles north of Léogâne, someone had dumped 24 bodies on the side of the road, most of them children, including a newborn infant and a toddler wearing a diaper and one white sandal. Her other foot was bare.
Next to the bodies was a freshly dug grave about 5 by 12 feet across and 6 feet deep. Villagers said the bodies appeared to be from somewhere other than this area, with some saying they believed they might be from Carrefour, the neighborhood of Port-au-Prince that is closest to here.
The villagers say that the United Nations came with a digger to make the grave, but that it was up to the local people to move the badly decomposed bodies into it. Covering their mouths and noses with lemon-soaked rags for the smell, they pulled the bodies onto a corrugated tin slab, then dragged the slab into the hole.
The same thing happened last Sunday, the villagers said, only then it was 18 bodies and the villagers had to dig the hole themselves.
"We want to get on a radio show and tell the people that the people of Carrefour dumped the bodies here and that is not fair," said Margaret Estima, 38. "It's hard on us because I'm a mother too," she said. "We cried."
The Marines will be witnessing more of Haiti's sorrows as they continue to move out of the capital with heavy equipment to clear debris and take on other missions. Told about the dead children on the side of the road, Capt. Clark Carpenter, 34, of Princeton, Idaho, the unit's public affairs officer, took a long pause.
"It's a really horrible situation," he said finally. "I've been watching this through the eyes of the media, but as we get out and see it, the true scope will become apparent."
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By RAY RIVERA
Published: January 19, 2010
LÉOGÂNE, Haiti — The Marine helicopters began landing just before noon on Tuesday in a cow pasture here in this heavily damaged farming town about nine miles south of Port-au-Prince, kicking up strong winds and drawing crowds of the curious and hopeful.
Multimedia
Slide Show
U.S. Troops Step Up Haiti Role
Interactive Feature
Perspectives on Haiti's Earthquake
Interactive Feature
Haiti Earthquake Multimedia
Related
U.S. Troops Patrol Haiti, Filling a Void (January 20, 2010)
Tiny Steps Toward Basic Services (January 20, 2010)
53 Haitian Orphans Are Airlifted to U.S. (January 20, 2010)
Room for Debate: Is the U.S. Doing Enough for Haiti?
Haiti Disaster Relief: How to Contribute | Tips on Donating
About 125 Marines eventually landed here and planned to stay about 24 hours to unload initial shipments of water and food. They expected to spend the night camped out in the pasture.
The relief effort was the United States military's first significant mission outside Port-au-Prince, the devastated capital, where the needs remain daunting.
For some of the Marines, the work in Haiti is deeply personal.
Cpl. Clifford Sajous, 22, of Elmont, N.Y., grew up in Port-au-Prince, and some of his family, including his father, brother, a cousin and three young nephews, ages 10, 8 and 7, have been living in the city. None of them have been heard from.
Corporal Sajous, who is doubling as a translator on the mission here, said he has not let thoughts of his missing family members interfere with his work. But for the young corporal, who lived in Haiti until he was 13, the images he has seen on television while shipboard on the way from Norfolk have been wrenching.
"I really wanted to cry," he said, "because that's where I grew up. A lot of those places I recognize, and seeing all these people dead and people running out of food and water, that hurts me."
"Even here," he added, "we're going to hand out some water and food and not everyone is going to get some."
The Marines passed the food they brought to the United Nations, which sent it by truck to a nearby stadium to be distributed. Corporal Sajous and other company translators filtered into the crowd to explain where the aid was going. But the message wasn't getting out to everyone.
"Yes, they are going to give it to us," said Son Son Maurice, 25, as he stood waiting. Asked if he was sure, he said "Yes, I am sure."
The Marines did not leave the cow pasture on Tuesday, and what they witnessed of the damage in the area they saw from the sky as their helicopters flew in.
The devastation here is immense, but harder to see quickly here than in the city of Port-au-Prince, where toppled buildings line the streets. Here in Léogâne, buildings are scattered amid sugar cane fields and banana trees, but it is easier to count the structures still standing than those that have collapsed.
People here believe about 5,000 people died in the town.
If there was any symbolic significance to Marines landing here after past United States interventions in this troubled country, few here seemed to care. Some in the crowd even joked with the Marines who were standing guard with rifles slung over their shoulders.
"You know we are in a bad situation, so I am glad they came to help us," said Charlius Saint Louis, 45, who lost a 15-year-old daughter and 12-year-old son in the earthquake, as well as a girlfriend who was pregnant with his child.
On a drive to the town from Port-au-Prince, damage could be seen all along the route. Long fissures lined the two-lane paved road. One of the lanes was covered in many sections by boulders and soil from landslides.
At a village called Mona Bateau about two miles north of Léogâne, someone had dumped 24 bodies on the side of the road, most of them children, including a newborn infant and a toddler wearing a diaper and one white sandal. Her other foot was bare.
Next to the bodies was a freshly dug grave about 5 by 12 feet across and 6 feet deep. Villagers said the bodies appeared to be from somewhere other than this area, with some saying they believed they might be from Carrefour, the neighborhood of Port-au-Prince that is closest to here.
The villagers say that the United Nations came with a digger to make the grave, but that it was up to the local people to move the badly decomposed bodies into it. Covering their mouths and noses with lemon-soaked rags for the smell, they pulled the bodies onto a corrugated tin slab, then dragged the slab into the hole.
The same thing happened last Sunday, the villagers said, only then it was 18 bodies and the villagers had to dig the hole themselves.
"We want to get on a radio show and tell the people that the people of Carrefour dumped the bodies here and that is not fair," said Margaret Estima, 38. "It's hard on us because I'm a mother too," she said. "We cried."
The Marines will be witnessing more of Haiti's sorrows as they continue to move out of the capital with heavy equipment to clear debris and take on other missions. Told about the dead children on the side of the road, Capt. Clark Carpenter, 34, of Princeton, Idaho, the unit's public affairs officer, took a long pause.
"It's a really horrible situation," he said finally. "I've been watching this through the eyes of the media, but as we get out and see it, the true scope will become apparent."
Tiny Steps Toward Basic Services
Michael Appleton for The New York Times
Haitians lined up for water Tuesday in Port-au-Prince. The public water utility in the capital has come to a virtual standstill, but patchwork solutions have surfaced. More Photos >
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By GINGER THOMPSON and DEBORAH SONTAG
Published: January 19, 2010
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Almost every wing of St.-François de Sales Hospital lies in ruins. But about 68 doctors and nurses have turned what is left into a triage center that performed at least 17 operations Tuesday.
Multimedia
Graphic
Neighborhood Snapshot
Interactive Feature
Perspectives on Haiti's Earthquake
Slide Show
U.S. Troops Step Up Haiti Role
Related
53 Haitian Orphans Are Airlifted to U.S. (January 20, 2010)
U.S. Marines Land in Villages on the Edge (January 20, 2010)
U.S. Troops Patrol Haiti, Filling a Void (January 20, 2010)
Haiti Disaster Relief: How to Contribute | Tips on Donating
Interactive: The Missing | Connecting to Those Affected
The collapse of the Lycée Marie-Jeanne, a school for girls, has turned it into a crypt for scores of eighth graders. But staff members report there daily to comb through the debris for whatever they can salvage to help reopen the school.
A dozen officers were killed when last week's earthquake flattened the police precinct at Delmas 32. But those who are left have filled the open shifts and organized meetings with residents to discuss strategies for fending off looters.
One week after the disaster that left Port-au-Prince and surrounding areas in ruins, the toll on this country has been measured almost entirely in lives. But Haiti's institutions, weak as they were, have been grievously wounded, too. A day immersed in this country's struggle to recover makes it clear that their absence leaves a palpable void.
"The country was fairly dysfunctional before this," said former Prime Minister Michèle Pierre-Louis. "The institutions were weak. People were left largely on their own. But this has wiped out everything."
While the world has rushed to rescue those trapped in the rubble, and provide assistance to the tens of thousands left without shelter, food and water, Haitians have jumped in as well to help the relief effort, to slowly begin the gargantuan task of digging out and carrying on.
Fledgling efforts were visible in Peguyville, where leaders have organized camps filled with thousands of those left homeless into committees responsible for everything from security to burning trash.
Haitians in Carrefour have volunteered with Adventist missionaries to help operate feeding programs and water purification stations. And at the University of Haiti, professors summoned students by text messages and deputized them to serve as trauma counselors for a shocked population.
"The state is broken, the people are broken, but it is time to mobilize," said Tirone Joël, 24, a psychology student. "We can sit back and wait for help from our friends abroad, or we can use our own talents and take charge of one little corner of this situation."
Every corner of the courtyard at St.-François de Sales Hospital was occupied by people wounded in the earthquake. Medical experts said that the hospital was considered a reference center for the country, and that it trained dozens of doctors, nurses and lab technicians each year.
Established by nuns in the late 1800s, the hospital reserves half of its 140 beds for the poor. Since the earthquake, a wing of the dormitory has been converted to operating rooms that are managed by a 73-year-old nurse named Maxis Astevelne.
Stepping away from an operating table where doctors were suturing the skull of an 8-year-old boy, the nurse said she was proud of the way her colleagues had pulled together to save lives.
Her own husband's body still lay beneath the rubble of her house, she said. But she has been at the hospital every day to help get it up and running.
"We don't get paid much," she said. "And we don't have all the equipment we want. But we do the best with what God has given us."
The earthquake struck the police precinct at Delmas 32 at shift change. And officers there consider it a major miracle that all but 12 officers escaped the station house before it collapsed.
After days of disarray, the officers reported to the station on Saturday to bury one of their shift commanders and 11 other colleagues in a pit behind the commissary. On Saturday afternoon, officers were out on motorbikes looking for fuel for their police cars, and that night a reduced force was out on patrol.
The threat of mass looting seems to increase by the day. And the police here have long been outmatched by criminal gangs in money and guns. Inspector Thelemarque Dielph was resigned to accepting help from abroad.
"Smart people know what they can do by themselves," he said, "and also what they cannot do."
The water system in Haiti before the earthquake may not have been fair or ideal: rich neighborhoods and hotels received chlorinated water from one set of pipes, while everyone else relied on city water pumped in for part of the day, augmented by water trucks that appeared daily in neighborhoods. Still, most of the sprawling city had access to water.
Michael Appleton for The New York Times
Haitians lined up for water Tuesday in Port-au-Prince. The public water utility in the capital has come to a virtual standstill, but patchwork solutions have surfaced. More Photos >
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By GINGER THOMPSON and DEBORAH SONTAG
Published: January 19, 2010
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Almost every wing of St.-François de Sales Hospital lies in ruins. But about 68 doctors and nurses have turned what is left into a triage center that performed at least 17 operations Tuesday.
Multimedia
Graphic
Neighborhood Snapshot
Interactive Feature
Perspectives on Haiti's Earthquake
Slide Show
U.S. Troops Step Up Haiti Role
Related
53 Haitian Orphans Are Airlifted to U.S. (January 20, 2010)
U.S. Marines Land in Villages on the Edge (January 20, 2010)
U.S. Troops Patrol Haiti, Filling a Void (January 20, 2010)
Haiti Disaster Relief: How to Contribute | Tips on Donating
Interactive: The Missing | Connecting to Those Affected
The collapse of the Lycée Marie-Jeanne, a school for girls, has turned it into a crypt for scores of eighth graders. But staff members report there daily to comb through the debris for whatever they can salvage to help reopen the school.
A dozen officers were killed when last week's earthquake flattened the police precinct at Delmas 32. But those who are left have filled the open shifts and organized meetings with residents to discuss strategies for fending off looters.
One week after the disaster that left Port-au-Prince and surrounding areas in ruins, the toll on this country has been measured almost entirely in lives. But Haiti's institutions, weak as they were, have been grievously wounded, too. A day immersed in this country's struggle to recover makes it clear that their absence leaves a palpable void.
"The country was fairly dysfunctional before this," said former Prime Minister Michèle Pierre-Louis. "The institutions were weak. People were left largely on their own. But this has wiped out everything."
While the world has rushed to rescue those trapped in the rubble, and provide assistance to the tens of thousands left without shelter, food and water, Haitians have jumped in as well to help the relief effort, to slowly begin the gargantuan task of digging out and carrying on.
Fledgling efforts were visible in Peguyville, where leaders have organized camps filled with thousands of those left homeless into committees responsible for everything from security to burning trash.
Haitians in Carrefour have volunteered with Adventist missionaries to help operate feeding programs and water purification stations. And at the University of Haiti, professors summoned students by text messages and deputized them to serve as trauma counselors for a shocked population.
"The state is broken, the people are broken, but it is time to mobilize," said Tirone Joël, 24, a psychology student. "We can sit back and wait for help from our friends abroad, or we can use our own talents and take charge of one little corner of this situation."
Every corner of the courtyard at St.-François de Sales Hospital was occupied by people wounded in the earthquake. Medical experts said that the hospital was considered a reference center for the country, and that it trained dozens of doctors, nurses and lab technicians each year.
Established by nuns in the late 1800s, the hospital reserves half of its 140 beds for the poor. Since the earthquake, a wing of the dormitory has been converted to operating rooms that are managed by a 73-year-old nurse named Maxis Astevelne.
Stepping away from an operating table where doctors were suturing the skull of an 8-year-old boy, the nurse said she was proud of the way her colleagues had pulled together to save lives.
Her own husband's body still lay beneath the rubble of her house, she said. But she has been at the hospital every day to help get it up and running.
"We don't get paid much," she said. "And we don't have all the equipment we want. But we do the best with what God has given us."
The earthquake struck the police precinct at Delmas 32 at shift change. And officers there consider it a major miracle that all but 12 officers escaped the station house before it collapsed.
After days of disarray, the officers reported to the station on Saturday to bury one of their shift commanders and 11 other colleagues in a pit behind the commissary. On Saturday afternoon, officers were out on motorbikes looking for fuel for their police cars, and that night a reduced force was out on patrol.
The threat of mass looting seems to increase by the day. And the police here have long been outmatched by criminal gangs in money and guns. Inspector Thelemarque Dielph was resigned to accepting help from abroad.
"Smart people know what they can do by themselves," he said, "and also what they cannot do."
The water system in Haiti before the earthquake may not have been fair or ideal: rich neighborhoods and hotels received chlorinated water from one set of pipes, while everyone else relied on city water pumped in for part of the day, augmented by water trucks that appeared daily in neighborhoods. Still, most of the sprawling city had access to water.
Now, the public water utility in Port-au-Prince does not appear to be operating. On the lawn of the utility's offices, in one of several efforts to stand in for the broken-down agency, a team of 10 Germans has set up a filtration system to produce potable water, but it has not been able to find tankers to transport it to the hardest-hit areas of the city.
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Perspectives on Haiti's Earthquake
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U.S. Troops Step Up Haiti Role
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It was yet another sign that Haiti's government provided services until last week that even the most efficient aid groups are inevitably struggling to match.
Trash collection is another example. Before the earthquake, it had been one of the government's bright spots. Large plastic bins in most neighborhoods were emptied with little difficulty weekly, or daily in some places. These days, the government contractor in charge of some waste collection has become the main resource for collecting dead bodies; city garbage trucks appear only sporadically to clear the refuse.
Inside the walls of the Lycée Marie-Jeanne, the principal was overwhelmed. Her eyes nearly shut with fatigue, a bandanna over her nose, she shuffled in slippers around the open-air entrance to her half-destroyed school, directing workers as they extracted computers from the rubble, which also contained the bodies of some of her students.
"I was here and suffer the consequences of this earthquake in my soul," the principal, Francesca Polycarpe, said. "These girls were my charges. I am so depressed. But I have to salvage what I can. I have to lift myself out of my own misery because maybe, maybe, there is a future for our Haitian schools."
Many schools still standing have been converted into improvised campgrounds for the homeless. Reading, writing and arithmetic are the last things on almost anybody's mind, although one student of Lycée Marie-Jeanne still reports for class every morning.
"She really needs serious mental help," Ms. Polycarpe said. "But there will be a long period of psychological recovery for everyone who survived, students and teachers, too."
Once teeming with middle school and high school girls in crisply starched uniforms, the courtyard is littered with spiral notebooks, composition books and flat black shoes.
Only one building in the public school complex collapsed, and Ms. Polycarpe believes that most of the 2,000 afternoon-shift students were able to flee. But scores of eighth graders were studying in ground-floor classrooms that were flattened, and their parents, like Jean Telcide, who showed up on Tuesday, are hoping that their bodies will someday be excavated.
For now, Ms. Polycarpe said, food, water, shelter and medical help are more important than algebra and history. "It is hard to imagine restarting the school system this year," she said.
"But as soon as possible," she added, "we need teams of trauma counselors and we need to recreate an academic milieu for our children. Right now, I don't know how to find them and offer them comfort."
Multimedia
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Neighborhood Snapshot
Interactive Feature
Perspectives on Haiti's Earthquake
Slide Show
U.S. Troops Step Up Haiti Role
Related
53 Haitian Orphans Are Airlifted to U.S. (January 20, 2010)
U.S. Marines Land in Villages on the Edge (January 20, 2010)
U.S. Troops Patrol Haiti, Filling a Void (January 20, 2010)
Haiti Disaster Relief: How to Contribute | Tips on Donating
Interactive: The Missing | Connecting to Those Affected
It was yet another sign that Haiti's government provided services until last week that even the most efficient aid groups are inevitably struggling to match.
Trash collection is another example. Before the earthquake, it had been one of the government's bright spots. Large plastic bins in most neighborhoods were emptied with little difficulty weekly, or daily in some places. These days, the government contractor in charge of some waste collection has become the main resource for collecting dead bodies; city garbage trucks appear only sporadically to clear the refuse.
Inside the walls of the Lycée Marie-Jeanne, the principal was overwhelmed. Her eyes nearly shut with fatigue, a bandanna over her nose, she shuffled in slippers around the open-air entrance to her half-destroyed school, directing workers as they extracted computers from the rubble, which also contained the bodies of some of her students.
"I was here and suffer the consequences of this earthquake in my soul," the principal, Francesca Polycarpe, said. "These girls were my charges. I am so depressed. But I have to salvage what I can. I have to lift myself out of my own misery because maybe, maybe, there is a future for our Haitian schools."
Many schools still standing have been converted into improvised campgrounds for the homeless. Reading, writing and arithmetic are the last things on almost anybody's mind, although one student of Lycée Marie-Jeanne still reports for class every morning.
"She really needs serious mental help," Ms. Polycarpe said. "But there will be a long period of psychological recovery for everyone who survived, students and teachers, too."
Once teeming with middle school and high school girls in crisply starched uniforms, the courtyard is littered with spiral notebooks, composition books and flat black shoes.
Only one building in the public school complex collapsed, and Ms. Polycarpe believes that most of the 2,000 afternoon-shift students were able to flee. But scores of eighth graders were studying in ground-floor classrooms that were flattened, and their parents, like Jean Telcide, who showed up on Tuesday, are hoping that their bodies will someday be excavated.
For now, Ms. Polycarpe said, food, water, shelter and medical help are more important than algebra and history. "It is hard to imagine restarting the school system this year," she said.
"But as soon as possible," she added, "we need teams of trauma counselors and we need to recreate an academic milieu for our children. Right now, I don't know how to find them and offer them comfort."
U.S. Troops Patrol Haiti, Filling a Void
Carlos Barria/Reuters
American troops landed at the National Palace in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, on Tuesday. They began rolling through the capital and assisting with the relief operation. More Photos >
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By MARC LACEY
Published: January 19, 2010
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — American military helicopters landed on Tuesday at Haiti's wrecked National Palace, and troops began rolling through the capital's battered streets, signs of the growing international relief operation here. But the troops' presence underscored the rising complaints that the Haitian government had all but disappeared in the week since a huge earthquake struck.
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Perspectives on Haiti's Earthquake
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U.S. Troops Step Up Haiti Role
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Haiti Quake Day 8: Haiti's First Lady
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53 Haitian Orphans Are Airlifted to U.S. (January 20, 2010)
U.S. Marines Land in Villages on the Edge (January 20, 2010)
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Room for Debate: Is the U.S. Doing Enough for Haiti?
Haiti Disaster Relief: How to Contribute | Tips on Donating
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More Multimedia on the Haiti Earthquake
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Read All Comments (209) »
Haiti's long history of foreign intervention, including an American occupation, normally makes the influx of foreigners a delicate issue.
But with the government of President René Préval largely out of public view and the needs so huge, many Haitians are shunting aside their concerns about sovereignty and welcoming anybody willing to help — in camouflage or not.
"It is not ideal to have a foreign army here, but look at the situation," said Énide Edoword, 24, a waitress who was standing in a camp of displaced people. "We are living amid filth and hunger and thirst after a catastrophe."
When Mr. Préval asked religious and business leaders at a meeting on Saturday whether they supported the intervention of the United States Marines, the response came with a caveat.
"They said, 'Yes — as long as it's temporary,' " said Bishop Jean-Zache Duracin of Haiti's Episcopal Church, who attended the meeting. "We have no choice because the government has collapsed."
At the international airport, where the United States Air Force now controls incoming and departing planes, Haitian officials are on hand and insist that it is still theirs, even if it more resembles a military base.
"We are like a country whose capital has been hit by two atomic bombs," said Patrick Elie, a presidential adviser and former defense minister.
"We are obviously in a moment of disarray, if not pain, and we have to regroup," he added. "But let no one point a finger and say, 'Where is the state?' People who say that don't understand the extent of the damage."
But many were still pointing fingers.
"We have a vacuum of government," asserted Michèle Pierre-Louis, who had been Mr. Préval's prime minister until she was ousted a few months ago. "The big question is, Who's in charge? We don't feel as though there is someone organizing all this."
Mr. Préval, an aloof leader even in the best of times, huddled with advisers on Tuesday at a compact police station that has become the government's de-facto headquarters. Aides described him as being as traumatized by the recent events as every other Haitian but still fully engaged in the nation's recovery.
They said he and his ministers were engaged in a furious effort to organize all the outside aid, find refuge for the hundreds of thousands of people living in the streets and bury bodies, thousands and thousands of which have been collected and put in mass graves so far as of Tuesday morning. (There is still no widely accepted death toll.)
They said the president would soon address the nation for the first time since the quake struck on Jan. 12.
But the international effort has far outpaced anything Haiti could manage: supply flights from around the world continued to arrive in numbers, though aid groups complained of being turned away.
In New York, the United Nations secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, said that the United Nations' food agency had distributed rations for 200,000 people so far, and other officials said the aim was to quickly supply 4.2 million rations of high-nutrition food for children.
Mr. Ban said the agency was aiming to feed one million people by the end of this week and two million by the end of next week — though three million or more people are estimated to need food.
In Port-au-Prince, the capital, foreign rescue teams scoured buildings for survivors under the rubble. A joint New York City Police-Fire rescue team on Tuesday pulled out two children from the rubble of a collapsed building in the capital, The Associated Press reported. A police spokesman, Paul J. Browne, said that the 8-year-old boy and the 10-year-old girl were taken to an Israeli tent hospital for treatment, The A.P. reported. Foreign doctors provided medical care and carried out scores of life-saving amputations.
But the demand for medical care far outstripped the supply of doctors. Debarati Guha-Sapir, a professor of epidemiology and the director of the Center for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters at the University of Louvain in Belgium, said that deaths in large earthquakes generally declined after the first day or two.
Carlos Barria/Reuters
American troops landed at the National Palace in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, on Tuesday. They began rolling through the capital and assisting with the relief operation. More Photos >
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By MARC LACEY
Published: January 19, 2010
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — American military helicopters landed on Tuesday at Haiti's wrecked National Palace, and troops began rolling through the capital's battered streets, signs of the growing international relief operation here. But the troops' presence underscored the rising complaints that the Haitian government had all but disappeared in the week since a huge earthquake struck.
Multimedia
Interactive Feature
Perspectives on Haiti's Earthquake
Slide Show
U.S. Troops Step Up Haiti Role
Video
Haiti Quake Day 8: Haiti's First Lady
Related
53 Haitian Orphans Are Airlifted to U.S. (January 20, 2010)
U.S. Marines Land in Villages on the Edge (January 20, 2010)
Tiny Steps Toward Basic Services (January 20, 2010)
Room for Debate: Is the U.S. Doing Enough for Haiti?
Haiti Disaster Relief: How to Contribute | Tips on Donating
Interactive: The Missing | Connecting to Those Affected
More Multimedia on the Haiti Earthquake
Readers' Comments
Readers shared their thoughts on this article.
Read All Comments (209) »
Haiti's long history of foreign intervention, including an American occupation, normally makes the influx of foreigners a delicate issue.
But with the government of President René Préval largely out of public view and the needs so huge, many Haitians are shunting aside their concerns about sovereignty and welcoming anybody willing to help — in camouflage or not.
"It is not ideal to have a foreign army here, but look at the situation," said Énide Edoword, 24, a waitress who was standing in a camp of displaced people. "We are living amid filth and hunger and thirst after a catastrophe."
When Mr. Préval asked religious and business leaders at a meeting on Saturday whether they supported the intervention of the United States Marines, the response came with a caveat.
"They said, 'Yes — as long as it's temporary,' " said Bishop Jean-Zache Duracin of Haiti's Episcopal Church, who attended the meeting. "We have no choice because the government has collapsed."
At the international airport, where the United States Air Force now controls incoming and departing planes, Haitian officials are on hand and insist that it is still theirs, even if it more resembles a military base.
"We are like a country whose capital has been hit by two atomic bombs," said Patrick Elie, a presidential adviser and former defense minister.
"We are obviously in a moment of disarray, if not pain, and we have to regroup," he added. "But let no one point a finger and say, 'Where is the state?' People who say that don't understand the extent of the damage."
But many were still pointing fingers.
"We have a vacuum of government," asserted Michèle Pierre-Louis, who had been Mr. Préval's prime minister until she was ousted a few months ago. "The big question is, Who's in charge? We don't feel as though there is someone organizing all this."
Mr. Préval, an aloof leader even in the best of times, huddled with advisers on Tuesday at a compact police station that has become the government's de-facto headquarters. Aides described him as being as traumatized by the recent events as every other Haitian but still fully engaged in the nation's recovery.
They said he and his ministers were engaged in a furious effort to organize all the outside aid, find refuge for the hundreds of thousands of people living in the streets and bury bodies, thousands and thousands of which have been collected and put in mass graves so far as of Tuesday morning. (There is still no widely accepted death toll.)
They said the president would soon address the nation for the first time since the quake struck on Jan. 12.
But the international effort has far outpaced anything Haiti could manage: supply flights from around the world continued to arrive in numbers, though aid groups complained of being turned away.
In New York, the United Nations secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, said that the United Nations' food agency had distributed rations for 200,000 people so far, and other officials said the aim was to quickly supply 4.2 million rations of high-nutrition food for children.
Mr. Ban said the agency was aiming to feed one million people by the end of this week and two million by the end of next week — though three million or more people are estimated to need food.
In Port-au-Prince, the capital, foreign rescue teams scoured buildings for survivors under the rubble. A joint New York City Police-Fire rescue team on Tuesday pulled out two children from the rubble of a collapsed building in the capital, The Associated Press reported. A police spokesman, Paul J. Browne, said that the 8-year-old boy and the 10-year-old girl were taken to an Israeli tent hospital for treatment, The A.P. reported. Foreign doctors provided medical care and carried out scores of life-saving amputations.
But the demand for medical care far outstripped the supply of doctors. Debarati Guha-Sapir, a professor of epidemiology and the director of the Center for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters at the University of Louvain in Belgium, said that deaths in large earthquakes generally declined after the first day or two.
"Haiti, I think, is going to be a little different," she said. "They will die simply because there is no care. People will die of wounds. They will die of lack of surgical care. They will die of simple trauma that in almost any other country would not lead to death."
Multimedia
Interactive Feature
Perspectives on Haiti's Earthquake
Slide Show
U.S. Troops Step Up Haiti Role
Video
Haiti Quake Day 8: Haiti's First Lady
Related
53 Haitian Orphans Are Airlifted to U.S. (January 20, 2010)
U.S. Marines Land in Villages on the Edge (January 20, 2010)
Tiny Steps Toward Basic Services (January 20, 2010)
Room for Debate: Is the U.S. Doing Enough for Haiti?
Haiti Disaster Relief: How to Contribute | Tips on Donating
Interactive: The Missing | Connecting to Those Affected
More Multimedia on the Haiti Earthquake
Readers' Comments
Readers shared their thoughts on this article.
Read All Comments (209) »
Elisabeth Delatour Préval, Haiti's first lady, insisted that the country's sovereignty remained intact, although she acknowledged that there was widespread concern among the population about whether the government was functioning, especially given the heavy damage sustained by the palace and other highly visible government buildings.
"Visually, people can't see what they used to recognize as the symbols of the state," she said in an interview. "That has generated some kind of panic. 'Are they there or aren't they there?' "
The American military, which began patrolling in Humvees up and down Boulevard Jean-Jacques Dessalines, the capital's main commercial strip, took pains to reassure Haitians that the United States was in the country in a support role.
Meanwhile, 125 Marines arrived in helicopters in the damaged farming town of Léogâne, south of the capital, delivering cases of water and food.
Col. Gregory Kane of the United States Army told reporters at the Port-au-Prince airport that the Haitian government remained in charge. He said that United States forces were on the ground only to assist with the relief efforts.
"There have been some reports and news stories out there that the U.S. is invading Haiti," Colonel Kane said. "We're not invading Haiti. That's ludicrous. This is humanitarian relief."
Most Haitians seemed to see it that way, despite deep historic concerns about American troops in particular.
President Woodrow Wilson sent American Marines to Haiti in 1915 to restore public order after six different leaders ruled the country in quick succession, each killed or forced into exile. Opposition was intense, but it would be nearly two decades before the Marines would leave, in 1934.
When President Bill Clinton ordered troops into the country in 1994 to restore Jean-Bertrand Aristide, who was ousted as president by a group of former soldiers, Haitian critics raised that earlier intervention.
A decade later, Mr. Aristide was forced out of office, and he accused the United States of orchestrating his ouster.
But on Tuesday, as American troops in combat fatigues bounded out of the helicopters and moved across the palace grounds, hundreds of Haitians who had gathered at the white-and-green palace gates erupted in cheers and called out in Creole for food and water.
"We can't do it without them," said Ms. Pierre-Louis, the former prime minister. "This country has been mismanaged for the last 50 years, and if we can't run the country well in normal times how can we do it now?"
Other troops are on the way. The United Nations Security Council on Tuesday unanimously approved sending 3,500 more police officers and peacekeeping troops to Haiti to maintain public order and to guard deliveries as the aid effort gathers steam.
The forces will augment the roughly 9,000 United Nations troops already here.
So far, violence has been scattered in Port-au-Prince. But senior United Nations officials said it might boil over at any moment as the difficulties of living without water, food and shelter mounted.
Mrs. Préval said that she and the president were about to enter their private residence when the earthquake struck. They stepped back from the home, she said, and it collapsed before them. For hours, rumors circulated around the capital that she had been killed.
She said that Mr. Préval quickly jumped onto the back of a motorcycle taxi to tour hospitals and damaged areas with top aides, and that he had been in nonstop emergency meetings ever since. Government ministers, she added, initially held meetings in the yard of the president's home.
The streets of Port-au-Prince contained scenes of commerce and activity on Tuesday morning, instead of just devastation and death. Merchants sold fruits and vegetables amid the rubble of destroyed businesses. More cars were winding through the debris-strewn streets.
Multimedia
Interactive Feature
Perspectives on Haiti's Earthquake
Slide Show
U.S. Troops Step Up Haiti Role
Video
Haiti Quake Day 8: Haiti's First Lady
Related
53 Haitian Orphans Are Airlifted to U.S. (January 20, 2010)
U.S. Marines Land in Villages on the Edge (January 20, 2010)
Tiny Steps Toward Basic Services (January 20, 2010)
Room for Debate: Is the U.S. Doing Enough for Haiti?
Haiti Disaster Relief: How to Contribute | Tips on Donating
Interactive: The Missing | Connecting to Those Affected
More Multimedia on the Haiti Earthquake
Readers' Comments
Readers shared their thoughts on this article.
Read All Comments (209) »
Elisabeth Delatour Préval, Haiti's first lady, insisted that the country's sovereignty remained intact, although she acknowledged that there was widespread concern among the population about whether the government was functioning, especially given the heavy damage sustained by the palace and other highly visible government buildings.
"Visually, people can't see what they used to recognize as the symbols of the state," she said in an interview. "That has generated some kind of panic. 'Are they there or aren't they there?' "
The American military, which began patrolling in Humvees up and down Boulevard Jean-Jacques Dessalines, the capital's main commercial strip, took pains to reassure Haitians that the United States was in the country in a support role.
Meanwhile, 125 Marines arrived in helicopters in the damaged farming town of Léogâne, south of the capital, delivering cases of water and food.
Col. Gregory Kane of the United States Army told reporters at the Port-au-Prince airport that the Haitian government remained in charge. He said that United States forces were on the ground only to assist with the relief efforts.
"There have been some reports and news stories out there that the U.S. is invading Haiti," Colonel Kane said. "We're not invading Haiti. That's ludicrous. This is humanitarian relief."
Most Haitians seemed to see it that way, despite deep historic concerns about American troops in particular.
President Woodrow Wilson sent American Marines to Haiti in 1915 to restore public order after six different leaders ruled the country in quick succession, each killed or forced into exile. Opposition was intense, but it would be nearly two decades before the Marines would leave, in 1934.
When President Bill Clinton ordered troops into the country in 1994 to restore Jean-Bertrand Aristide, who was ousted as president by a group of former soldiers, Haitian critics raised that earlier intervention.
A decade later, Mr. Aristide was forced out of office, and he accused the United States of orchestrating his ouster.
But on Tuesday, as American troops in combat fatigues bounded out of the helicopters and moved across the palace grounds, hundreds of Haitians who had gathered at the white-and-green palace gates erupted in cheers and called out in Creole for food and water.
"We can't do it without them," said Ms. Pierre-Louis, the former prime minister. "This country has been mismanaged for the last 50 years, and if we can't run the country well in normal times how can we do it now?"
Other troops are on the way. The United Nations Security Council on Tuesday unanimously approved sending 3,500 more police officers and peacekeeping troops to Haiti to maintain public order and to guard deliveries as the aid effort gathers steam.
The forces will augment the roughly 9,000 United Nations troops already here.
So far, violence has been scattered in Port-au-Prince. But senior United Nations officials said it might boil over at any moment as the difficulties of living without water, food and shelter mounted.
Mrs. Préval said that she and the president were about to enter their private residence when the earthquake struck. They stepped back from the home, she said, and it collapsed before them. For hours, rumors circulated around the capital that she had been killed.
She said that Mr. Préval quickly jumped onto the back of a motorcycle taxi to tour hospitals and damaged areas with top aides, and that he had been in nonstop emergency meetings ever since. Government ministers, she added, initially held meetings in the yard of the president's home.
The streets of Port-au-Prince contained scenes of commerce and activity on Tuesday morning, instead of just devastation and death. Merchants sold fruits and vegetables amid the rubble of destroyed businesses. More cars were winding through the debris-strewn streets.
Marines diverted to Haiti, another quake hits
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SOLDIERS TOLD TO STOP HANDING OUT FOOD
Food handouts were shut off Tuesday to thousands of people at a tent city here when the main U.S. aid agency said the Army should not be distributing the packages.
It was not known whether the action reflected a high-level policy decision at the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) or confusion in a city where dozens of entities are involved in aid efforts.
"We are not supposed to get rations unless approved by AID," Maj. Larry Jordan said.
Jordan said that approval was revoked; water was not included in the USAID decision, so the troops continued to hand out bottles of water. The State Department and USAID did not respond to requests for comment.
Jordan has been at the airport supervising distribution of individual food packages and bottled water since his arrival last week. Each package provides enough calories to sustain a person for a day.
The food is flown by helicopter to points throughout the capital and distributed by paratroopers of the 82nd Airborne Division. At the tent city, set up at a golf course, more than 10,000 people displaced by the Haitian earthquake lay under makeshift tents. Each day, hundreds of people, many young children, line up for a meal.
Tuesday morning, the helicopters came only with water. Soldiers carried boxes of water in the hot sun and supervised Haitian volunteers who handed the supplies out.
By Jim Michaels, USA TODAY
EARLIER HAITI COVERAGE
Interactives: Photos from Haiti | Map of earthquake zone | Timeline of deadly quakes
Haiti: Country's outlook had been improving | Geology points to big quakes
Washington: Obama pledges starter of $100M in relief | Status halts deportations | Clinton, Bush combine efforts
Reaction: Churches offer solace | News slow to reach loved ones | Facebook becomes 'lifeline'
Aid: Donations may break records | Private donors critical | U.S. agencies coordinate rescues | World mobilizes relief
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By Tom Vanden Brook and Marisol Bello, USA TODAY
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — A 6.1-magnitude earthquake that lasted about five to seven seconds awoke Haitians, aid workers and journalists in Port-au-Prince at 6:03 a.m. ET Wednesday.
Later in the day, 4,000 more U.S. troops were ordered to the devastated nation.
At a hotel near the airport where small temblors have been felt daily, the shock sent occupants into the courtyard, some in pajamas and some in their underwear.
A security officer with the relief agency World Vision yelled "Get outside! Run! Run!" to people in the hallway. That led to an urgent, heart-racing sprint out of the hotel. Several people hugged once they were outside.
One World Vision staffer was injured when she fell and missed a step on her way out.
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"This morning was scary for me as an adult. I can't imagine what it is like for the children who are sleeping out on the streets," said Laura Blank, an aid worker with World Vision. "If I'm shaken up I can only imagine how scared they must be right now."
Blank said she was still in bed and only partially awake when the quake struck. She said she started to run to the bathroom because she wasn't sure she could exit fast enough. She didn't know what to expect because she had never been in an earthquake before, she said.
The morning quake was the largest of more than 40 significant aftershocks that have followed the apocalyptic Jan. 12 quake that left much of the country in ruins. The extent of additional damage or injuries was not immediately clear.
The U.S. Geological Survey said Wednesday's quake was centered about 35 miles northwest of Port-au-Prince and 6.2 miles below the surface — a little further from the capital than last week's epicenter was.
"It kind of felt like standing on a board on top of a ball," said U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Steven Payne. The 27-year-old from Jolo, W. Va., was preparing to hand out food to refugees in a tent camp of 25,000 quake victims when the aftershock hit.
Before the second quake struck, U.S. military officials said they would land relief planes at two more airports Wednesday and hoped to have a seaport open by the end of the week to help victims of last week's Haiti earthquake.
Maj. Gen. Daniel Allyn, deputy commander of the U.S. military's relief operation in Haiti, said a second airport will be open for relief flights by Wednesday. The airstrip at Jacmel, about 30 miles southeast of Port-au-Prince, will be able to accommodate C-130 cargo planes. Another airport in San Isidro in the neighboring Dominican Republic will be opened to relief flights as well, he said.
Navy officials announced Wednesday that the three-ship USS Nassau Amphibious Ready Group left port Monday for its regular deployment to Europe but was told to go Haiti instead for the earthquake relief effort.
The group is picking up Marines in the state of North Carolina and will include 2,000 sailors and 2,000 Marines when it gets underway for Haiti, perhaps as early as Thursday.
Also Wednesday, former president George W. Bush tried to reassure Haitians that they would not be forgotten.
In an interview with Voice of America, Bush said, "I hope the people of Haiti know that our government is doing everything it can with our military and USAID to get food, medicine and water to you as quickly as possible."
A U.S. Navy salvage ship has been surveying the damaged seaport in Port-au-Prince, and it could begin accepting cargo ships within days, Allyn said. U.S. troops also began landing helicopters Tuesday on the lawn of the shattered presidential palace.
"We are obviously very conscious of the need to have multiple points of entry," Allyn said.
HOW TO HELP: Ways to donate to Haiti earthquake victims
ORPHANAGE: Supplies low, water scarce
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Haiti's main airport at Port-au-Prince has been overwhelmed by flights bringing supplies and personnel. Relief groups, including Doctors Without Borders, have complained of a massive bottleneck at the airport, inhibiting the flow of aid.
U.S. officials have defended their handling of the airport and insisted the Haitian government is in charge of prioritizing aid. The airport received 180 flights on Monday, 10 times its normal capacity, according to the U.S. Southern Command.
"The assistance that is getting to the airport is getting out to the people of Haiti," State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said. "The challenge is we're not at the point where we can sustain 3 million people."
Fede Felissaint, a Haitian hairdresser, said he did not mind the increasing number of U.S. troops in Haiti. "If they want, they can stay longer than in 1915," he said, referring to the start of a 19-year U.S. military presence in Haiti.
Five countries, including the USA, are providing medical care, Allyn said. The USNS Comfort, with its 1,000 hospital beds and 600 medical personnel, is due to arrive in Haiti today, he said. The United Nations Security Council voted to add 3,500 troops and police officers to the 9,000 peacekeepers already in the country.
Opening the port could prove the most important upgrade, said Pat Johns of Catholic Relief Services. "A vessel can move a heck of a lot of food," he said.
Contributing: Ken Dilanian and Mimi Hall; Oren Dorell in McLean, Va.
Updated 45m ago | Comments 204 | Recommend 11 E-mail | Save | Print | Reprints & Permissions |
SOLDIERS TOLD TO STOP HANDING OUT FOOD
Food handouts were shut off Tuesday to thousands of people at a tent city here when the main U.S. aid agency said the Army should not be distributing the packages.
It was not known whether the action reflected a high-level policy decision at the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) or confusion in a city where dozens of entities are involved in aid efforts.
"We are not supposed to get rations unless approved by AID," Maj. Larry Jordan said.
Jordan said that approval was revoked; water was not included in the USAID decision, so the troops continued to hand out bottles of water. The State Department and USAID did not respond to requests for comment.
Jordan has been at the airport supervising distribution of individual food packages and bottled water since his arrival last week. Each package provides enough calories to sustain a person for a day.
The food is flown by helicopter to points throughout the capital and distributed by paratroopers of the 82nd Airborne Division. At the tent city, set up at a golf course, more than 10,000 people displaced by the Haitian earthquake lay under makeshift tents. Each day, hundreds of people, many young children, line up for a meal.
Tuesday morning, the helicopters came only with water. Soldiers carried boxes of water in the hot sun and supervised Haitian volunteers who handed the supplies out.
By Jim Michaels, USA TODAY
EARLIER HAITI COVERAGE
Interactives: Photos from Haiti | Map of earthquake zone | Timeline of deadly quakes
Haiti: Country's outlook had been improving | Geology points to big quakes
Washington: Obama pledges starter of $100M in relief | Status halts deportations | Clinton, Bush combine efforts
Reaction: Churches offer solace | News slow to reach loved ones | Facebook becomes 'lifeline'
Aid: Donations may break records | Private donors critical | U.S. agencies coordinate rescues | World mobilizes relief
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By Tom Vanden Brook and Marisol Bello, USA TODAY
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — A 6.1-magnitude earthquake that lasted about five to seven seconds awoke Haitians, aid workers and journalists in Port-au-Prince at 6:03 a.m. ET Wednesday.
Later in the day, 4,000 more U.S. troops were ordered to the devastated nation.
At a hotel near the airport where small temblors have been felt daily, the shock sent occupants into the courtyard, some in pajamas and some in their underwear.
A security officer with the relief agency World Vision yelled "Get outside! Run! Run!" to people in the hallway. That led to an urgent, heart-racing sprint out of the hotel. Several people hugged once they were outside.
One World Vision staffer was injured when she fell and missed a step on her way out.
CHAT: Answers to your questions on Haiti donations
FLOATING HOSPITAL: USNS Comfort begins its healing mission
RELIEF: Quality of care a matter of luck in Haiti
ADOPTIONS: Americans eager to embrace Haitian orphans
RECOVERY: Haiti's health crisis deepens as efforts continue
"This morning was scary for me as an adult. I can't imagine what it is like for the children who are sleeping out on the streets," said Laura Blank, an aid worker with World Vision. "If I'm shaken up I can only imagine how scared they must be right now."
Blank said she was still in bed and only partially awake when the quake struck. She said she started to run to the bathroom because she wasn't sure she could exit fast enough. She didn't know what to expect because she had never been in an earthquake before, she said.
The morning quake was the largest of more than 40 significant aftershocks that have followed the apocalyptic Jan. 12 quake that left much of the country in ruins. The extent of additional damage or injuries was not immediately clear.
The U.S. Geological Survey said Wednesday's quake was centered about 35 miles northwest of Port-au-Prince and 6.2 miles below the surface — a little further from the capital than last week's epicenter was.
"It kind of felt like standing on a board on top of a ball," said U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Steven Payne. The 27-year-old from Jolo, W. Va., was preparing to hand out food to refugees in a tent camp of 25,000 quake victims when the aftershock hit.
Before the second quake struck, U.S. military officials said they would land relief planes at two more airports Wednesday and hoped to have a seaport open by the end of the week to help victims of last week's Haiti earthquake.
Maj. Gen. Daniel Allyn, deputy commander of the U.S. military's relief operation in Haiti, said a second airport will be open for relief flights by Wednesday. The airstrip at Jacmel, about 30 miles southeast of Port-au-Prince, will be able to accommodate C-130 cargo planes. Another airport in San Isidro in the neighboring Dominican Republic will be opened to relief flights as well, he said.
Navy officials announced Wednesday that the three-ship USS Nassau Amphibious Ready Group left port Monday for its regular deployment to Europe but was told to go Haiti instead for the earthquake relief effort.
The group is picking up Marines in the state of North Carolina and will include 2,000 sailors and 2,000 Marines when it gets underway for Haiti, perhaps as early as Thursday.
Also Wednesday, former president George W. Bush tried to reassure Haitians that they would not be forgotten.
In an interview with Voice of America, Bush said, "I hope the people of Haiti know that our government is doing everything it can with our military and USAID to get food, medicine and water to you as quickly as possible."
A U.S. Navy salvage ship has been surveying the damaged seaport in Port-au-Prince, and it could begin accepting cargo ships within days, Allyn said. U.S. troops also began landing helicopters Tuesday on the lawn of the shattered presidential palace.
"We are obviously very conscious of the need to have multiple points of entry," Allyn said.
HOW TO HELP: Ways to donate to Haiti earthquake victims
ORPHANAGE: Supplies low, water scarce
AID: Mission uses lessons of war
Haiti's main airport at Port-au-Prince has been overwhelmed by flights bringing supplies and personnel. Relief groups, including Doctors Without Borders, have complained of a massive bottleneck at the airport, inhibiting the flow of aid.
U.S. officials have defended their handling of the airport and insisted the Haitian government is in charge of prioritizing aid. The airport received 180 flights on Monday, 10 times its normal capacity, according to the U.S. Southern Command.
"The assistance that is getting to the airport is getting out to the people of Haiti," State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said. "The challenge is we're not at the point where we can sustain 3 million people."
Fede Felissaint, a Haitian hairdresser, said he did not mind the increasing number of U.S. troops in Haiti. "If they want, they can stay longer than in 1915," he said, referring to the start of a 19-year U.S. military presence in Haiti.
Five countries, including the USA, are providing medical care, Allyn said. The USNS Comfort, with its 1,000 hospital beds and 600 medical personnel, is due to arrive in Haiti today, he said. The United Nations Security Council voted to add 3,500 troops and police officers to the 9,000 peacekeepers already in the country.
Opening the port could prove the most important upgrade, said Pat Johns of Catholic Relief Services. "A vessel can move a heck of a lot of food," he said.
Contributing: Ken Dilanian and Mimi Hall; Oren Dorell in McLean, Va.
Haití: llegan refuerzos y mejora entrega de víveres
| 2010-01-20 | El Diario NY
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Un soldado de EE.UU. organiza a los damnificados para que reciban alimentos. (FOTO: ap) ap
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PUERTO PRINCIPE/AP — Decenas de soldados estadounidenses aterrizaron ayer en los jardines del palacio presidencial de Haití, en medio de vítores de las víctimas del terremoto, y la ONU dijo que enviará más soldados y policías para acelerar las tareas de ayuda al devastado país caribeño.
Las fuerzas de la ONU ayudarán a controlar los estallidos de violencia y saqueos que demoran la distribución de provisiones, privando de ayuda a muchos haitianos una semana después del terremoto de magnitud 7.0 que dejó unos 200.000 muertos.
El Consejo de Seguridad de la ONU aprobó el envío de 2.000 soldados para sumarse a los 7.000 efectivos de las fuerzas de paz y 1.500 agentes para la fuerza policial internacional de 2.100.
Los haitianos se abarrotaron en la verja del palacio con cara de sorpresa, dando vítores a medida que los soldados saltaban a tierra.
"Estamos felices de que lleguen, porque tenemos muchos problemas", dijo Fede Felissaint, un peluquero.
Una semana después del sismo, el puerto de la capital sigue bloqueado y el único aeropuerto se ha convertido en un cuello de botella que los militares estadounidenses intentan romper. Decenas de miles duermen en las calles o bajo hojas de plástico en campamentos improvisados. Los socorristas dicen que temen ir a ciertas partes de la ciudad.
Los analistas de la Comisión Europea estiman que 250,000 personas resultaron heridas y 1.5 millones se quedaron sin hogar.
| 2010-01-20 | El Diario NY
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Un soldado de EE.UU. organiza a los damnificados para que reciban alimentos. (FOTO: ap) ap
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PUERTO PRINCIPE/AP — Decenas de soldados estadounidenses aterrizaron ayer en los jardines del palacio presidencial de Haití, en medio de vítores de las víctimas del terremoto, y la ONU dijo que enviará más soldados y policías para acelerar las tareas de ayuda al devastado país caribeño.
Las fuerzas de la ONU ayudarán a controlar los estallidos de violencia y saqueos que demoran la distribución de provisiones, privando de ayuda a muchos haitianos una semana después del terremoto de magnitud 7.0 que dejó unos 200.000 muertos.
El Consejo de Seguridad de la ONU aprobó el envío de 2.000 soldados para sumarse a los 7.000 efectivos de las fuerzas de paz y 1.500 agentes para la fuerza policial internacional de 2.100.
Los haitianos se abarrotaron en la verja del palacio con cara de sorpresa, dando vítores a medida que los soldados saltaban a tierra.
"Estamos felices de que lleguen, porque tenemos muchos problemas", dijo Fede Felissaint, un peluquero.
Una semana después del sismo, el puerto de la capital sigue bloqueado y el único aeropuerto se ha convertido en un cuello de botella que los militares estadounidenses intentan romper. Decenas de miles duermen en las calles o bajo hojas de plástico en campamentos improvisados. Los socorristas dicen que temen ir a ciertas partes de la ciudad.
Los analistas de la Comisión Europea estiman que 250,000 personas resultaron heridas y 1.5 millones se quedaron sin hogar.
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