Thursday 8 November 2012

Israeli rescue team arrives in Ghana today

President John Dramani Mahama has accepted an offer from Israel to help locate and extract any remaining survivors in the collapsed Melcom shopping mall disaster that took place on Wednesday.

An 18-man team from Israel will arrive in the country today. A statement signed by the President’s Spokesperson, John Abdulai Jinapor, said the Israeli team will be working in close collaboration with the detachment from the Field Engineers Regiment of the Ghana Army currently at the site.

The hard work of the Field Engineers, NADMO and other emergency institutions including the Ghana Police and the National Ambulance Service have led to the rescue of at least fifty-one persons from the rubble.

Mr. Jinapor said the team will make an initial assessment of the site using special equipment and sniffer dogs that will help identify the locations of possible survivors or corpses.

An additional team of about one hundred and fifty (150) with additional equipment including field hospitals, concrete cutters among others are on standby to move to Ghana should the initial assessment deems it necessary.

President Mahama on Wednesday suspended his campaign in the Upper East Region and flew to Accra following news of the collapsed building. He has since visited the site and some hospitals where the rescued workers and shoppers are recuperating.

Thursday 8 November 2012

http://edition.myjoyonline.com/pages/news/201211/96895.php

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Update on Melcom disaster: Over 70 people rescued, five dead

Over 70 people have so far been pulled out of the rubble from the collapsed Melcom building at Achimota.

The accident which occurred Wednesday has claimed at least five lives and injured many more.

Rescuers worked throughout the night to find more survivors under the rubble. It’s not clear when the operation will be over but officials believe it could take some days.

Joy FM’s Elton John Brobbey, reporting from the scene, said a woman who was rescued Thursday morning died shortly and was identified by her husband.

He said the rescue team has created an opening on top of the rubble from where they enter to pull out the victims. “What is making the work difficult is the fact that they are not aware of the number of people trapped inside,” Elton said.

Meanwhile an 18-man team from Israel will arrive in the country today to help with the rescue effort.

A statement from the Presidency said the Israeli team will be working in close collaboration with the detachment from the Field Engineers Regiment of the Ghana Army currently at the site

Thursday 8 november 2012

http://edition.myjoyonline.com/pages/news/201211/96915.php

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Districts to have disaster management bodies

In order to address the scarcity of resource gaps and trained manpower, the government is establishing disaster management institutions at district level in the country, said National Disaster Management Authority chairman Dr Zafar Iqbal on Wednesday.

“For the purpose, it is linking Rescue 1122 and Centre for Disaster Preparedness and Management with volunteer and social activities in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa,” Dr Zafar told the inaugural session of the fourth two-day National Disaster Management Exhibition at Sheikh Mohammad Taimur Academic Block of University of Peshawar here.

The exhibition was organised by Centre for Disaster Preparedness and Management in collaboration with AFC International and Pakistan Science Foundation.

The NDMA chairman said his organisation was adopting the Malaysian model of disaster preparedness and mitigation as a national policy.

He said the National Policy of Disaster Risk Reduction was in the final stage of approval besides the NDMA has prepared a 10 years plan for disaster risk reduction as well.

Dr Iqbal said the government was introducing the Disaster Risk Insurance for the entire population.

“It will cover compensation to individuals for their losses in cases of untoward happenings. This move is being taken to ensure systemic institutional response to disasters,” he said.

The NDMA chairman said Pakistan was the first country to have come up with such policies and solutions for its countrymen, and as, the most experienced country in disasters.

He said the mechanism development had been made on the formula of one disaster manager per 100 people and therefore, it would generate 1.8 million jobs for Pakistani youth in the government and nongovernmental organisations in near future.

CDPM director Professor Amir Nawaz Khan said the centre was offering the stand alone BS and MSc degree level programme from this year, besides one year diplomas for disaster management practitioners in the country.

He added that the centre was the first one of its kind in South Asia and presently three hundred and fifty students are enrolled with them which would available in the job market within two years.

Thursday 8 november 2012

http://dawn.com/2012/11/08/districts-to-have-disaster-management-bodies/

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Guatemala earthquake: 48 dead, residents fear aftershocks

Guatemalans fearing aftershocks huddled in the dark and frigid streets of this mountain town wrapped in blankets early on Thursday, while others crowded inside its hospital, the only building left with electricity after a powerful earthquake killed at least 48 people and left dozens more missing.

Crews worked through the night in San Marcos, searching rubble for survivors and more dead following the magnitude 7.4 quake that struck on Wednesday near Guatemala's border with Mexico.

In the town of San Cristóbal Cucho, firefighters picked at a collapsed house trying to dig out 10 members of one family, including a four-year-old child, who were buried, fire department spokesman Ovidio Perez told the radio station Emisoras Unidas.

Volunteers carrying boxes of medical supplies began arriving in the area in western Guatemala late on Wednesday.

Eblin Cifuentes, a 26-year-old law student, and a group of his classmates already were collecting medical supplies as part of a school drive to provide aid for the only hospital in San Marcos, a poor, mainly indigenous mountain area of subsistence farms. When the quake hit, the group decided to bring everything they had collected.

"Thank God nothing happened to us and that's why we have to help out," Cifuentes said.

The quake caused terror over an unusually wide area, with damage reported in all but one of Guatemala's 22 states and shaking felt as far away as Mexico City, 600 miles (965 km) to the north-west.

It hit hardest in San Marcos, where more than 30 homes collapsed and many of the colourful adobe buildings in its centre were either cracked or reduced to rubble, including the police station and the courthouse. The tore a large gash in one of the streets. Hundreds of frightened townspeople stayed in the open, refusing to go back inside after more than five strong aftershocks shook the area.

President Otto Pérez Molina said that 40 people died in the state of San Marcos and eight more were killed in the neighbouring state of Quetzaltenango.

Hundreds of people crammed into the hallways of San Marcos' small hospital after the quake seeking help for injured family members. Some complained they were not getting care quickly enough.

Ingrid Lopez, who bought in a 72-year-old aunt whose legs were crushed by a falling wall, said she had waited hours for an X-ray.

"We ask the president to improve conditions at the hospital," she said. "There isn't enough staff."

More than 300 firefighters, police officers and civilians dug desperately at a half-tonne mound of sand at a quarry trying to rescue seven people believed buried alive. Among those under the sand was a six-year-old boy who had accompanied his grandfather to work.

"I want to see Giovanni! I want to see Giovanni!" the boy's mother, 42-year-old Francisca Ramirez, frantically cried. "He's not dead. Get him out."

By Wednesday night, firefighters had dug out two bodies from the quarry, including Giovanni's.

Pérez flew to San Marcos to view the damage in this lush mountainous region of 50,000 indigenous farmers and ranchers, many belonging to the Mam ethnic group.

"One thing is to hear about what happened and another thing entirely is to see it," the president said. "As a Guatemalan I feel sad ... to see mothers crying for their lost children."

Pérez said the government would pay for the funerals of all victims in the region.

Efrain Ramos helped load a tiny casket carrying the body of his six-year-old niece from San Marcos' morgue to a waiting pickup truck.

"The little girl died when a wall fell over her," a shocked Ramos told a reporter. He said the girl was playing in her room when the quake hit.

Sobbing uncontrollably, the girl's mother hugged the coffin wrapped with white lace and tulle.

Ramos said the family would escort his niece Rosa's body back home for a viewing.

The quake, which was 20 miles deep, was centred 15 miles off the coastal town of Champerico and 100 miles south-west of Guatemala City. It was the strongest earthquake to hit Guatemala since a 1976 temblor that killed 23,000.

Officials said most of 100 missing were from San Marcos, where people farm corn and herd cattle, mostly for their own survival.

Hospital officials in San Marcos said they had received 150 injured.

Pérez said more than 2,000 soldiers were deployed to help with the disaster. A plane had made at least two trips to carry relief teams to the area.

Thursday 8 November 2012

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/nov/08/guatemala-earthquake-victims-fear-aftershocks

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