Gangs of men armed with machetes were seen looting parts of Port-au-Prince, Haiti on Jan. 14, 2010.
Posted on 01/14/2010 3:00:32 PM PST by NCjim
Desperate Haitians turned rubble-strewn streets and parks into makeshift hospitals and refugee camps on Thursday in the absence of any noticeable response from authorities in Haiti after Tuesday's earthquake.
With the 7.0 magnitude earthquake collapsing the presidential palace, a string of ministries and the headquarters of the U.N. peacekeeping mission in the country, Haiti faces a dangerous vacuum in security and government.
The Caribbean nation of 9 million people, the poorest in the western hemisphere, has a turbulent history of conflict, social turmoil, dictatorship, fragile institutions and devastating natural catastrophes.
Many in the capital Port-au-Prince picked away at shattered buildings with bare hands, sticks and hammers hoping to find loved-ones alive. Thousands of homeless people began to set up their own camps anywhere they could, the biggest right opposite the collapsed presidential palace.
"Look at us. Who is helping us? Right now, nobody," said Jean Malesta, a 19-year-old student who was the only survivor when her apartment building collapsed from the powerful quake that has killed thousands, possibly tens of thousands.
She and a dozen others lay under a tent they had set up in the park opposite President Rene Preval's palace. His weak and under-resourced government appears totally unequipped to handle the crisis, its officials in disarray and nowhere to be seen.
'WE ARE ON OUR OWN'
"So far, they have brought us nothing. We need water, food, shelter, everything, but we are on our own," Malesta added, to cries of agreement from women sitting and lying around her.
A major international aid effort has not yet kicked in, although plenty of small groups, many from the United States, have scrambled quickly, moving personnel into Haiti by plane and overland from neighboring Dominican Republic.
"The problem is that unlike traditional disaster situations we have few local partners to work with, because most of them have had their buildings destroyed and are looking for their own dead and missing," said Margaret Aguirre, a senior official with International Medical Corps.
Haitians are doing their best to survive chaotic conditions in the absence of any clear leadership, said Latin America expert Dan Erikson of the Washington-based Inter-American Dialogue think tank.
"The sad truth is that no one is in charge of Haiti today. This vacuum, coupled with the robust response from the Obama administration, has inevitably created a situation where the U.S. will be the de facto decision-maker in Haiti."
Even President Rene Preval lost his home. "My palace collapsed. ... I can't live in the palace, I can't live in my own house," he told CNN on Wednesday.
The 9,000-strong U.N. peacekeeping force, which might have been able to step into the void, has been left counting its own dead after its headquarters were destroyed in the quake.
The United Nations said 36 of its personnel in Haiti had been killed and many more were still missing.
Peacekeepers occasionally patrolled the city in buses and trucks and have mobilized some heavy earth-moving equipment but the blue-helmet soldiers have largely stayed off the streets.
Underlying the growing sense of chaos and abandonment around the half-destroyed coastal capital Port-au-Prince, some looting began -- a phenomenon Haitians have seen many times before in past political crises.
At one crushed supermarket, young men calmly carried off bags of food and electronics without a policemen in sight.
Pickup trucks stacked high with bodies could be seen making their way through traffic-clogged streets on Thursday morning, on their way to drop off the dead at the morgue attached to Hospital General, the city's main health facility.
But Guy LaRoche, the hospital's director, said it was already filled to overflowing with more than 1,500 rapidly decomposing bodies. Many had been left lying out in the sun. LaRoche said he had had no contact with any government officials to see what to do with them.
LOOMING HEALTH THREAT
"I'm awaiting the decision of the government. What else can I do?" he said. "The health threat, from disease, could be another catastrophe. We need nurses, medical teams, more of everything."
Around the city, many Haitians put rags and masks over their faces as the stench from rotting bodies began to rise. Crushed cars and vans stuck out of collapsed buildings, while children's toys, shoes and papers were scattered on streets.
In poor areas, there was little sign of any coordinated rescue activities.
"I think 50 percent of the city is destroyed," said Vladimir Rousseau, a 32-year-old diesel engineer, in the hard-hit Carrefour district.
Reuters witnesses saw some city blocks completely leveled, though in other areas the damage was more patchy.
In the upscale, hilltop Petionville sector, a Chilean contingent of U.N. peacekeepers -- many of whom arrived only last week and looked stunned at events -- were helping excavate rubble at the landmark Hotel Montana, which collapsed.
They said they had pulled out 14 people alive already, foreign customers and local workers alike, and thought there were dozens more underneath the stones.
"There is no one in our country capable of sorting this out. Everyone is looking after their own families. Only the world can come to our rescue," said shop owner Edner Baptiste.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, pledging U.S. help for Haiti's crippled government, said: "The authorities that existed before the earthquake are not able to fully function."
They would in fact be seen as saviours.
Your prediction will probably come true in the next few days; the lead battalion of the 82nd Abn Div’s “ready brigade” is en route; an amphibious ready group, built around the USS Nassau and the 24th MEU departs the east coast early next week. It’s a sure bet that the amphib group and the Marines will wind up there as well. The aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson arrives tomorrow, and one of our hospital ship will be on station next week.
The security mission is pretty straight-forward; secure the airfield, the ports and other elements of key infrastructure (that are still usable). Establish security for the various offices/facilities that will be coming on line in the next week or so. Help the populace near these locations, then expand out into the countryside as more troops and resources become available.
BTW, some of the most important U.S. personnel in Haiti right now USAF combat controllers and aerial port specialists. The controllers are best known for calling in close air support in combat zones, but they’re also fully trained air traffic controllers. They’ve probably established a mobile ATC facility in Port-au-Prince and are doing most of the air traffic control work.
The aerial port specialists have the personnel, expertise and (most importantly) the hardware to unload those cargo planes piling up at the airport. A lot of countries sent aircraft that can’t be unloaded without K-loaders and other specialized equipment.
Haven’t heard it yet, so :”Bush’s Fault! (sarcasm)
So where has all the money gone ( loooong time passing.... ) that has been given to this poorest of poor nation? I mean...apparently the ruler lived in a palace that was bigger than our White House....have we been giving money to a nation that has not been distributing it to its poor?
You can distribute the money to the poor, but it won’t take long until that money is right back in the hands of the powers that be.
And how is that different from any given point in Hatian history save the U.S. occupation of 1915-34?
Funny. Same thing happened after Katrina.
The U.S. said enough was enough and had a ship load of marines there to put an end to it in a single day's time.
The marines occupied Haiti for the next 19 years. They were also the ONLY period of peace and stability in that country's entire history.
My God they live on an ISLAND> Why would they not bury at sea??
Gangs of men armed with machetes were seen looting parts of Port-au-Prince, Haiti on Jan. 14, 2010.
"My palace collapsed. ... I can't live in the palace!
Haiti President Rene Preval, January 14th, 2010
____________________________________________________________________
Not exactly a heroic Churchillian statement for the ages, is it?
World sympathy may well turn to shock and horror at the brutality that is quickly over running that nation.
Gangs of men armed with machetes were seen looting parts of Port-au-Prince, Haiti on Jan. 14, 2010.
“Where has all the money gone?’’ Good question. We American taxpayers have been having our pockets picked for decades sending money to this Caribbean pest-hole and now it’s ‘’ Hurry up America, you’ve got to help us’’! You know, its a tragedy to be sure but after awhile one runs out of compassion, especially for a people who seem never to have shown any interest in fixing their society and their nation. Haiti is the Mexico of the Caribbean.
I don’t know ... how far offshore would they have to go and how would they get there? These poor people don’t own boats. Looking at the map, it would seem that the way Port au Prince is situated, bodies not taken far, far out to sea will just return to a beach quickly. I’m not sure how the currents run off of that portion of Haiti. But you do bring up a good point.
49: worth remembering history.
I wonder if President Hope n’ Change will authorize shoot-to-kill orders, to get control?
Bodies sunk in deep water don’t come back up. I’m convinced that’s what happened to the American girl on Aruba. The water at depth is too cold to cause gases to form, so the corpses would stay down.
The people of Haiti feed their children dirt to fill their bellies ... I doubt they know anything about deep water decomposition or the lack thereof, nor do they have depthfinders. I’ve never heard of relief workers using mass burial at sea. Do you know of any cases? Did they do that after the tsunami a few years back?
And made a buck!
No, I’ve never heard of it being done. Mass burial in ravines or bulldozed ditches is more common, and was done after the tsunamis.
I dont know how far out these poor souls should be buried but a large scow towed five or ten miles off shore might work.
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