As I reported last night, a 7.0 Earthquake hit Haiti.
Now the death toll and damage tolls are being shown. Reader GWSSDelta told me about a video, that comes via CBS News:
CNN, MSNBC and Fox News all have in depth coverage. Memeorandum has an excellent Blog roundup on the political front.
CNN’s Anderson Cooper is in Haiti now:
No word on death tolls yet; but this does sound very bad. I will have more in a bit.
Update: Here is how you can help with the relief effort, via DIPNote:
For those interested in helping immediately, simply text “HAITI” to “90999” and a donation of $10 will be given automatically to the Red Cross to help with relief efforts, charged to your cell phone bill.
Or you can go online to organizations like the Red Cross and Mercy Corps Mercy Corps to make a contribution to the disaster relief efforts.
The State Department Operations Center has set up the following number for Americans seeking information about family members in Haiti: 1-888-407-4747. We’ll provide more details and opportunities to help as we learn more. To stay up-to-date, follow us on state.gov.
Update #2: The Anchoress Reports a list of Relief Organizations helping: (H/T Malkin)
Catholic Relief Services
United Methodist Committee on Relief
The Red Cross
Salvation Army
Providence in Haiti
American Jewish World Service
Lutheran World Relief
Cross International
World Vision
International Orthodox Christian Charities
Ya’ll know what to do. 😀
Update #3: As Always, our awesome Military is “on it!” Military Times is reporting:
The aircraft carrier Carl Vinson was rerouted Wednesday to support humanitarian relief efforts in Haiti, according to U.S. Southern Command. The carrier is expected to arrive off the coast of Haiti Thursday.
The command confirmed additional Navy ships are underway to Haiti, but did not specify what vessels would be going.
The command, based in Miami, also deployed a team of 30 people to Haiti to work with U.S. Embassy personnel as well as Haitian, U.N. and international officials to assess the situation and facilitate follow-on U.S. military support, according to the press release. The team includes military engineers, operational planners, a command and control group and communication specialists. They will arrive in Haiti today on two C-130 Hercules aircraft.
Elements of the Air Force 1st Special Operations Wing were deploying to the international airport at Port-au-Prince to provide air traffic control capability and airfield operations. They are expected to arrive in Haiti on Wednesday afternoon.
Early Wednesday morning, Coast Guard helicopters evacuated four critically injured U.S. Embassy staff to hospital at Naval Station Guantanamo, Cuba, for further treatment.
A U.S. P-3 Orion from the Forward Operating Location at Comalapa, El Salvador, also conducted aerial reconnaissance of the affected area.
SouthCom has supported 14 major relief missions in the region since 2005, including assistance to Haiti in September 2008. During that mission, forces from the amphibious assault ship Kearsarge and other units airlifted 3.3 million pounds of aid to communities that were devastated by a succession of major storms.
“Our thoughts and prayers are with the Haitian people and all those affected by this devastating earthquake,” said Army Col. James Marshall, SouthCom spokesman.
Vinson and its crew of approximately 3,200 sailors left Norfolk on Tuesday en route to their new homeport in San Diego. The carrier, which is commanded by Capt. Bruce Lindsey, was joined by Carrier Air Wing 17 and the cruisers Lake Champlain and Bunker Hill. As flagship of the newly established Carrier Strike Group 1, Vinson was to provide maritime security as it circumnavigates South America and provide humanitarian assistance or disaster relief, if required.
The call came fewer than 24 hours later.
Major Kudos on our Armed Forces for being ready for the call; wherever it might be from. Good Job men!
Update #4: The Daily Caller is linking to a story in the Daily Mail in the U.K. that as many as 100,000 are feared dead.
It is times like these, when I do wish that my Ham Radio Station was Operational… 🙁
Fox News also gives the background as to why this happened. Simply put, the earth is just old.
Update #5: The Anchoress links in. Thank you! 😀
Update #6: ….and of course, the Stupidity of the Christian Right Starts.
Update #7: Man, 2 two days and about 5K viewers later and I realize, I have the Country misspelled in the headline! D’oh! 🙄
My name is Ellen i have been looking at the videos about Haiti. It is devastating! I am only 11 years old so i can’t do much but pray for Haiti. My class is holding a prayer service this thursday in our school. I want to do so much for all the people but i can’t. I might hold a sale and donate the money to Haiti.
WHAT IS THE PROBLEM?
I have been involved in Emergency Responses for most of my adult career. The organizations and companies I have worked for were always training, exercising, and live drill response planning. Incident Command, Command structure response planning, NIMS, HSEEP, HAZMAT, TOP OFF Exercises, NRF, ESF, and the FEMA play book. I will assume most of you are familiar with these programs and the main purpose is to improve emergency response, and be capable to respond for any type of emergency event.
Seven days since Haiti earthquake, and the structure of the response is basically a cluster of organizations and US response, and yet even with logistics of moving relief being a supposed problem, it appears there is a TOTAL failure in organizational management to provide relief. What is the problem? Who is in charge? Why does Israel have a field hospital up and running and no one else seems to be able to do the same. Brazil, states they don’t want to release their COMMAND of UN troops and other support services, and they certainly are no expert to Emergency response. So what do we do?
Tsunami, Katrina were not this bad with response problems, and I blame the organizations that have been in Haiti, since the Hurricane of 2008, for not being more cognitive of Haiti’s own problems of response, and did not provide the right tools and training to improve the country’s own infrastructure.
Comments?
😥 i feel so bad for every one that was there during the earthquake my friends mother was over there during the earthquake and the house fell on her but she was okay nothing wrong with her at all god bless her and all others
Thank you for your coverage of the tragedy in Haiti and for putting our site on your list. We have been working in Haiti over 15 years and grieve that the injustices of this country were not being heard.
Today the cries are thunderous.
I just pray we don’t forget.
Again, thank you.
marcia erickson
providence ministries
No Problem Marcia. I report the truth. I am not happy, however, with the reaction of the rest of the world saying that the United States is occupying the country of Haiti. I think that’s crap and needs to stop, or we should leave. 😡
:( :(i feel really ad im 11 years old my name is brittney i hope you all ok. need help? just call on jesus he will here you all prayer today in jesus nameThank you Brittney. God Bless you.