Haiti

[ghost of miles]

Or at least its capital, Port-Au-Prince; that's almost the sense I'm getting reading and viewing the news coming out of there. My God... MSNBC just now reporting that all three Doctors Without Borders hospitals have collapsed.

Edited January 13, 2010 by ghost of miles

[ghost of miles]

Statement on the White House site with a link to the Red Cross donation site. Here's a link to Doctors Without Borders as well.

[Guy Berger]

There's not much to destroy except human lives at this point... it's a dirt-poor island. It won't take much in terms of resources to restore the island from its current super-miserable state to its normal just-miserable existence.

[brownie]

Haiti has always been a disaster area but this is beyond inhuman.

The Haitian PM Jan-Max Bellerive stated today that the toll could reach more than 100,000 dead!

[BeBop]

It's hard not to think of nice people that I've met during my visits. A long, sad history, yet still nice people, many of whom have/had maintained an upbeat and positive outlook. Sometimes, I wished I prayed.

[seeline]

i'm just horrified. it's beyond imagining, almost... makes me want to do *something* to help, right now.

[BruceH]

I hope they get some major aid there, fast.

[connoisseur series500]

How could so many lives be lost? It almost unfathomable. It's the first earthquake to hit the island since 1777, or something like that. In the 1990's, a volcano buried the Caribbean island of Montserrat, an island where my father grew up, and I have visited several times. My grandfather's old house and gravesite is under ashes. The volcano had been inactive for 400 years. That whole Caribbean island chain is a string of volcanos which runs from South America on up. Scary.

[Jazzmoose]

Moronic enlightenment

This really doesn't belong here, nor does the comment I wanted to make about his evil, disgusting person.

Oops.

[BeBop]

Building and infrastructure construction quality in Haiti is quite poor...the term "house of cards" comes to mind. Lots of corrugated steel, cardboard and plywood dwellings. Public buildings seem to have been built at low cost, possibly with someone pocketing the difference between the money made available for the project and what was actually spent.

Couple this with the likelihood of water-borne disease in a few days, resulting from poor hygiene and sanitation, and yes, I can see a terrible outcome.

(Note: I have not been following the news reports; I don't watch TV. I'm just going on my recollections. So if someone "on the ground" or someone with expertise tells you different, discount or dismiss anything I say.)

[jazzbo]

So very sad.

[BERIGAN]

Some reports say 500,000 may have died, 5% of the entire population! In a matter of minutes. One really can't comprehend that fact...

[Van Basten II]

Knowing plenty of people who were either born there or still have family there, you couldn't imagine how devastated they were by (once again ) those awful news.

By the way, no matter how good or bad the infrastructures were, we're talking about a 7.0 , very few buildings no matter where in the world they are will survive to this kind of powerful earthquake.

[Guy Berger]

By the way, no matter how good or bad the infrastructures were, we're talking about a 7.0 , very few buildings no matter where in the world they are will survive to this kind of powerful earthquake.

This is not true - I survived the strong 1989 earthquake in northern California (7.1) and the overwhelming majority of structures survived. That said, in most poor countries even earthquakes much weaker than 7.0 will be catastrophic - and Haiti is among the poorest of the poor.

Guy

[Van Basten II]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GXHopCrs46U&feature=player_embedded

[Adam]

By the way, no matter how good or bad the infrastructures were, we're talking about a 7.0 , very few buildings no matter where in the world they are will survive to this kind of powerful earthquake.

This is not true - I survived the strong 1989 earthquake in northern California (7.1) and the overwhelming majority of structures survived. That said, in most poor countries even earthquakes much weaker than 7.0 will be catastrophic - and Haiti is among the poorest of the poor.

Guy

Yes, but you were in California, where buildings do survive quakes and are built to more extreme measures than any other place on earth (except Japan, I think). But in most of the world, as Van Basten said, a 7.0 would level a large percentage of buildings.

Countries that are on faults, volcanoes, etc shoudl be building to the specs of California or Japan. But most don't due to costs, corruption.

Haiti has been a wreck ever since they defeated the French and the West decided to punish it forever. There's my extreme statement of the day.

They don't deserve this. I hope aid gets there quickly.

Edited January 14, 2010 by Adam

[BERIGAN]

The fault is similar in structure to the San Andreas fault that slices through California, Dr. Mann said.

Such earthquakes, which are called strike-slip, tend to be shallow and produce violent shaking at the surface.

“They can be very devastating, especially when there are cities nearby,” Dr. Mann said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/13/world/americas/13haiti.html

[sidewinder]

Shocking news from Haiti - and certainly puts the economic problems of the West into truer context.

[Jim R]

By the way, no matter how good or bad the infrastructures were, we're talking about a 7.0 , very few buildings no matter where in the world they are will survive to this kind of powerful earthquake.

This is not true - I survived the strong 1989 earthquake in northern California (7.1) and the overwhelming majority of structures survived. That said, in most poor countries even earthquakes much weaker than 7.0 will be catastrophic - and Haiti is among the poorest of the poor.

Guy

Yes, but you were in California, where buildings do survive quakes and are built to more extreme measures than any other place on earth (except Japan, I think). But in most of the world, as Van Basten said, a 7.0 would level a large percentage of buildings.

Countries that are on faults, volcanoes, etc shoudl be building to the specs of California or Japan. But most don't due to costs, corruption.

No offense, but it appears you really don't understand the two posts you quoted. The first statement was erroneous, and Guy was making the same point you're making. Anyway, carry on.

[GA Russell]

A man from my church (and a fellow Knights of Columbus member) is a nurse. Monday he and his wife went down to Haiti to help out for two weeks. On Tuesday the earthquake struck.

I received his email today:

"Many thanks for your prayers and concerns. The situation here is grim. Our team is ok with only minor scrapes. Many civilian casualties and several deaths so far. We are running short on supplies. Phones are down and our internet connection is our only link out. The local civilians are suffering horribly. Please continue to pray for Haiti."

[Adam]

By the way, no matter how good or bad the infrastructures were, we're talking about a 7.0 , very few buildings no matter where in the world they are will survive to this kind of powerful earthquake.

This is not true - I survived the strong 1989 earthquake in northern California (7.1) and the overwhelming majority of structures survived. That said, in most poor countries even earthquakes much weaker than 7.0 will be catastrophic - and Haiti is among the poorest of the poor.

Guy

Yes, but you were in California, where buildings do survive quakes and are built to more extreme measures than any other place on earth (except Japan, I think). But in most of the world, as Van Basten said, a 7.0 would level a large percentage of buildings.

Countries that are on faults, volcanoes, etc shoudl be building to the specs of California or Japan. But most don't due to costs, corruption.

No offense, but it appears you really don't understand the two posts you quoted. The first statement was erroneous, and Guy was making the same point you're making. Anyway, carry on.

I understood the first, but yes, I did miss some of Guy's. Sorry.

[Christiern]

I just saw Bloomberg, the guy who recently spent millions of his own dollars buying his own re-election ask people to contribute to Haiti. I didn't hear him pledge a dollar of his own.

[Son-of-a-Weizen]

(Note: I have not been following the news reports; I don't watch TV.

That's a shame. You're missing all of the important updates re: Leno and Conan taking daily potshots at NBC and one another. BIG YAWN.

[BeBop]

I still have the opportunity to follow this stuff; I get the USA Today on my hotel doorstep every day. Fortunately, the trash can is nearby. (Wait, is this offensive to someone in Arlington/Northern Virginia?)

[GA Russell]

I received this second email from our nurse parishioner this morning.

"Thanks for the support. We are out of most supplies and have cleared or transfered all of our patients. Damage was light here. No team casualties. We lost five children and two adults. I think around ten more will not survive in Haitian hospitals. We tried to evacuate today. It was a fiasco. The American consulate has lied to us as to what and how we needed to do to evacuate. They left at least three hundred US citizens on asphault all day in the sun without support. We will probably try to evacuate out through the Dominican Republic tomorrow morning. We will be out of contact until we return to the US. Please keep praying."