OT RE: "from a part of the world that has endured far too many tragedies "
It is very sad. We have an employee who is Gujarati - tomorrow I will find out if her relatives are safe. I am keeping my fingers crossed and hoping they are all safe.
The folks in Ahmedabad are very, very scared. About 130 buildings in Ahmedabad were destroyed. There's a lot of confusion over there. They are actually getting their news faster from CNN.com than they are from their own newspaper, due to the slower nature of print-style distribution. The power of Internet has been very, very helpful to them. I wonder if CNN.com even knows this?
There are folks from helicopters that are broadcasting to the area at large, informing folks not to go back inside their buildings, which is applicable for many buildings, but possibly not for all, but no one knows which buildings are safe until civil engineers investigate the buildings, which will take a long time. Many, many folks - engineers too - are living on the cold (55 degrees), dirty streets right now. I believe Intel has a site over there too.
The power and water was out for awhile, but was re-established with impressive speed. However, what is absolutely horrible is their effort to save lives is being horribly slowed down by a lack of cranes. The relief workers aren't doing enough, nor fast enough.
They need cranes to carefully remove rubble in order to get to the folks that are still caught underneath the rubble. And the more days that pass, the more their survival is put into danger. In the SF earthquake, I was told that someone was found live after 3 weeks, so making every effort to save folks from underneath rubble is very important, but the sooner the better.
I think these world-wide relief organizations really need to find a way to transport portable cranes. Maybe cranes that could be transported and assembled at site? The lack of cranes is the biggest roadblock for rescue efforts.
I wonder if a portable, light-weight crane could be designed so they can be easily transported from country to country during a disaster, assembled on site, where 'heavy weights' would be stored in fixed locations within countries in order to be plugged into the crane for establishing weight that cranes need in order to balance their loads.
The other issue folks are dealing with is a lack of medical assistance. They really need some type of portable medical transport units that could be flown in. The only offer of medical assistance offered was 20 doctors from UK. They need more. Especially in the other two cities - about 90% of homes destroyed in one of the cities.
CNN reports that 20,000 folks may have died in this earthquake. But from what I was told, the true count is probably 100,000+. Whatever number CNN reports, you can pretty much multiply that number by 5 - and this would be the case for almost all disasters that occur in India. I'm told that India always grossly under-estimates any disaster. Maybe this is how India handles/manages public fear, and is also due to the inability to account for everyone, like we can do in the USA.
India, by its culture appears to have a "live let live", non-complaining philosophy -- that is very contrary to our culture where we are very sensationalized. India does not have the the type of culture to be, nor the luxury to be sensational. India also has a cultural tendency to downplay their needs. This is what I understand the case to be.
The Red Cross released a whopping $45k worth of funds for grain and blankets and to deploy 11 relief workers. As if $45,000 is going to do much. All they can do with $45k is buy blankets and grain, but no cranes, no Rx, no tents. When I think of all the millions of dollars that were wasted on these dotcoms, I find it very disgusting and it makes me realize the world is not efficient and frugal with its use of money, especially the USA, and sometimes it can be very disgusting.
edit: I just found this article on ccn.com:
In Bhuj, where 200,000 people had lived, "nothing is standing there. It is completely devastated," he said. "Hardly anyone could have managed to survive."
And in Anjar, where 100,000 people were living last week, "the entire town has been completely devastated," he said. "There wasn't anything standing there except for some peripheral new structures. Otherwise, the whole town has been reduced to total rubble."
In Bhachau, which had a population of 65,000, "it's the same situation."
I would guess the total of loss in life is around 300,000+. India tends to underestimate their losses, which they originally said were around 5,000, then 20,000.
Regards,
Amy J |
