Haiti's president handed out medals to celebrities, aid-group directors and politicians for post-earthquake work

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti’s president handed out medals to celebrities, aid-group directors and politicians for post-earthquake work Monday in a ceremony designed to beat back criticism of an uneven recovery that has left 1.6 million people homeless and destitute six months to the day since the disaster.Just out of sight, baking in the oppressive noonday sun, were the fraying tarps of tens of thousands of homeless who live on the Champ de Mars, once a grassy promenade surrounding the government complex.

“That is just a way to put the people to sleep. But the people are suffering,” Edouard James, a 32-year-old vendor said when he was told of the ceremony. Unable to find a job with his degree in diplomacy, he sells pirated DVDs in a tarp-covered booth.”We are tired of the NGOs … saying we will have a better life and better conditions, and then nothing happens,” he said.Twenty-three honorees – including actor Sean Penn, CNN anchor Anderson Cooper and the head of the U.N. peacekeeping mission – crossed a podium in front of the crushed, unrepaired national palace to steady applause. Some smiling, some solemn, each received medals and certificates deeming them Knights of the National Order of Honor and Merit.

President Rene Preval, whose successor is to be elected in November, defended the response to the quake. He said in two speeches during the ceremony that hard-to-see successes – like the avoidance of massive disease outbreaks and violence – obviates the perception that not enough has been done.”There are people who did not see all the big efforts that were deployed during the emergency stage: distributing tents, water, food, installing latrines, providing health care during the six months that have just gone by,” Preval said. “It is a major, major task.”The ceremony was resolutely upbeat. The focus was on successes past and plans going forward, with little talk of the 230,000 to 300,000 people killed in the magnitude-7 temblor.

The president and prime minister, Jean-Max Bellerive, both used the occasion to announce that a six-month emergency phase has ended and that reconstruction has begun.The distinction was lost on some Haitians.”I don’t know if I’m mad or happy,” Anne Bernard, a 24-year-old mother of two living in a metal shack a few hundred yards from the national palace. “All I know is they haven’t done anything.”

The most visible early-emergency programs like massive food distributions have stopped, and there still are few tangible effects of $3.1 billion in humanitarian aid for all but a handful of those left homeless by the quake, who rely on plastic tarps for shelter.Tarp-and-tent camps are growing instead of shrinking. Just 5,657 transitional shelters have been built of a promised 125,000, which even if completed would not be nearly enough for everyone.When building materials finally get through customs, there is nowhere to put them. Fights over land rights, customs delays and systemically slow coordination between aid groups and the government have hampered nearly everything. The Associated Press reported Sunday that the location of the largest of two relocation camps provided by the government was the result of an inside deal.Shortly after the ceremony ended, that camp flooded in a sudden summer squal, with 94 deluxe tents collapsing in the wind and rain.Compounding the problem in the city is that almost no rubble has been cleared. Preval said Monday it would take $1.5 billion to remove all of it.

Meanwhile donors have met 10 percent of a promised $5.3 billion in reconstruction aid – separate from the humanitarian aid – mostly by forgiving debts, not providing cash.Clinton, who also received a medal, said it will be his mission in coming weeks to make sure donors meet their pledges. He acknowledged that more could have been done, but that recovery has so far been faster than the rebuilding of coastal Indonesia following the 2004 tsunami.”To those who say we have not done enough, I think all of us who are working in this area agree this is a harder job (than the tsunami),” Clinton said. “Viewed comparatively I think the Haitian government and the people who are working here have done well in the last six months.”

CNN’s Cooper, who spent parts of January and February in Haiti following the quake and had not returned since, said he found out about the award while getting ready to board his plane to Haiti on Sunday.”I thought a long time about not accepting it. We finally came to the opinion that it was recognition by the country for all journalists,” he told resident reporters after the ceremony. “I don’t think this in any way impacts the desire or willingness to be critical of the government.”(AP)

Why Chile Earthquake is not as bad effect like Earthquake as in Haiti ?

Mexico City An earthquake measuring 8.8 that struck Chile SR 500 times more powerful than the earthquake that shook 7 SR Haiti last month. But the level of death and destruction in Chile sedahsyat not like what happened in Haiti. The number of victims of the earthquake in Chile less than the number of earthquake victims in Haiti. The death toll from the earthquake in Chile for a while just reached 300 people, while the death toll in Haiti through the 200 thousand inhabitants. In Chile, the number of people who lost their homes less than Haiti, and also telephone and communications network could be restored within 5 hours. Why does this happen?

As reported by the Los Angeles Times, Sunday (28/2/2010), explained that the earthquake happened in Haiti is more shallow depth of 10 kilometers and the epicenter was only a few miles of a densely populated area such as the capital of Port-au-Prince. Meanwhile, Chilean earthquake occurred at a deeper depth of about 35 kilometers and centered off the coast of the sparsely populated community. Other causes of, namely because Chile are relatively well prepared to face an earthquake. Past events in 1960, when the strongest earthquake ever SR 9.5 magnitude devastated Chile, became a valuable experience for the country. Schools and even an earthquake exercise routine for students.

http://www.youtube.com/v/bJR8I_Vk5TU&rel=0&fs=1

tsunami threat along Australia's east coast, but authorities are still warning people to keep out of the water

An outgoing tide has eased the tsunami threat along Australia’s east coast, but authorities are still warning people to keep out of the water.Rising sea levels have been recorded at Norfolk Island, Southport in Tasmania and Port Kembla in New South Wales.A tsunami alert, issued after a massive earthquake in Chile, remains in place for Queensland, News South Wales, Victoria and Tasmania.Sea rises of 10 to 50 centimetres have spared coastlines, but officials warn there is still the risk posed by strong currents caused by accelerating tidal movements.

The Bureau of Meterology’s spokesman, Alasdair Hainsworth, says the threat is abating now the tide is on the way out.”We’re no longer talking about any kind of foreshore flooding. We’re simply now concerned about strong currents,” he said.Phil Campbell, from the NSW State Emergency Service, says beachgoers should not go swimming under any circumstances.”We’re advising people that they should not engage in any recreational boating in small boats, particularly as there are those strong currents that are likely to make that quite hazardous,” he said.

“For those people thinking of taking part in some rock fishing or fishing from beaches, we’d also recommend against those activites as well.”The weather bureau says the tsunami has not caused any measurable increase in wave movement in Queensland, but a marine alert remains current for the state’s waters north from the NSW border to St Lawrence.

South of Sydney, Port Kembla measured a rise of 10 to 15 centimetres above the water table, with water levels still increasing.The bureau says a second spike is being recorded at Norfolk Island, with the surge expected to continue towards Queensland.In Sydney, hundreds of people lined the promenade at Bondi Beach, waiting to see what impact the Chile earthquake would have on Australian shores.

Beachgoers were directed off the sand shortly before 8.30am AEDT and the beach was closed.But many people remained on the beach and in the water in defiance of the warnings.Surf Life Saving NSW says it is concerned several local councils have decided to open beaches despite the tsunami warning.Spokesman Steven Leahy says larger waves and stronger currents and rips are expected along the state’s coastline this afternoon.”Our advice is that the risk has not declined and in fact over the next couple of hours there is still every possibility that we will see some tsunami event,” he said.

TasmaniaElsewhere, the tsunami warning forced the cancellation of surf lifesaving activities on Tasmania’s east coast and southern beaches.The first signs of the tsunami in Tasmania were recorded at Maria Island off the state’s south-east coast, just after 8:00am (AEDT).

The weather bureau says the waves were expected to get bigger, and Marine Safety Tasmania says people should delay launching boats until the threat passed.It is considered unlikely the tsunami will have an effect on land.Much of Australia’s east coast was put on tsunami alert late yesterday with boats urged to return to harbour.The alert was issued after a massive 8.8 magnitude quake hit Chile, killing hundreds of people and sending giant waves speeding across the Pacific.Meanwhile, waves up to 1.5 metres high rammed into New Zealand’s east coast.

JAPAN was warned of the possibility of 10ft waves early today as a tsunami swept across the Pacific after the huge earthquake that struck Chile early yesterday

JAPAN was warned of the possibility of 10ft waves early today as a tsunami swept across the Pacific after the huge earthquake that struck Chile early yesterday. The first 12ft tsunami waves generated by the earthquake hit French Polynesia and the Chatham Islands in New Zealand. On an island off Chile the high waves swamped a village with five people dying and 11 missing but elsewhere there were no reports of damage though authorities warned that higher tides could come later. Waves of up to 6ft hit Hawaii at about midday local time, washing over a low-lying park near the city of Hilo.In Chile itself, hours after the pulverising shock of the magnitude 8.8 earthquake, rippled across the southern Andes, ministers in Santiago, the Chilean capital, said they did not expect the toll to rise much above the official toll of 214.

It seemed that a combination of strict building regulations in Chile and tsunami alarms throughout much of the region had averted what President Michelle Bachelet had initially called a “catastrophe”. The worst damage was inflicted on Concepcion, Chile’s second-largest city and the closest to the quake’s epicentre 70 miles out to sea. First reports described screams and cries from the ruins of a 15-storey building.

Alejandra Gouet, a television reporter in Concepcion, said: “There isn’t a street without damage.” Other reports spoke of buildings on fire across the city. The death toll, however, rose more slowly than had been expected at the outset. In the capital of Santiago, 200 miles from the epicentre, Bachelet warned that “we undoubtedly can’t rule out more deaths and injuries” but emphasised: “The system is functioning.” Huge waves pounded Chile’s Juan Fernandez archipelago, which includes the island where Alexander Selkirk, the Scottish sailor, was marooned in the 18th century, inspiring the novel Robinson Crusoe. Chile’s Easter Island, a world heritage site famed for its monumental Polynesian statues, was among the areas deemed most at risk. Tsunami warnings were issued to at least 59 nations and Pacific territories.

Charles McCreery, director of the Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre, said waves reaching Hawaii could be the largest to hit the islands since 1964. People had left the coast and petrol stations were jammed. On Tahiti traffic was banned from going within 500 yards of the sea. Central Chile was severely affected by the earthquake, which struck at 3.34am and was followed by violent aftershocks. Much of the country lost power, water supplies and communications. It was one of the most powerful tremors recorded in a region plagued for centuries by seismic upheaval. Concepcion was destroyed by earthquakes or tsunamis five times between 1570 and 1751, when the city was moved to a different location on the Bio-Bio river. It was destroyed again in 1835.

Charlotte Mountford, a Briton living in Santiago, said the tremor lasted about 30 seconds. “We crouched in bathtub on 14th floor while things smashed around us,” she wrote on the Twitter networking site. “Was terrifying.” John Grace, a British mining consultant, 54, said: “I have lived in Santiago 15 years and never felt anything like this earthquake before. It was by far the worst. I have a TV attached to the wall in my bedroom and it just collapsed.”

Claire Cunningham, 29, an IT consultant from Bromley, south London, added: “I am in Santiago on holiday with my husband, Tom. Our hotel room just rattled and rattled for a good minute. I thought the ceiling was about to cave in. It was horrifying. “We went down to the street and discovered that a TV mast had collapsed. There was concrete everywhere. If I had been under that at the time, I am sure I would have been killed.” The earthquake damaged 1.5m houses in Chile, one third of them seriously. Cars overturned, roads were split by fissures and the country suffered more than 100 aftershocks many of them stronger than five on the Richter scale.

On May 22, 1960, southern Chile was hit by the most powerful earthquake recorded, at a magnitude of 9.5. At least 1,600 people died. As a result, almost every large building constructed in Chile can withstand tremors. Yesterday’s earthquake was much more powerful than the 7.0 tremor that killed an estimated 230,000 people in Haiti in January, but the wealth Chile derives from being the world’s third-largest copper producer proved a significant barrier against mass destruction. “Chile is not Haiti,” noted one reporter. “The building codes are quite strict.”

earthquake on the coast of Chile has killed at least 52 people

A massive earthquake on the coast of Chile has killed at least 52 people, flattening buildings and triggering a tsunami. The 8.8-magnitude quake, the country’s largest in 25 years, shook the capital Santiago for a minute and half at 3:34am (0634 GMT) today. A tsunami warning has been extended across the Pacific rim, including most of Central and South America and as far as Australia and Antarctica. The wave has already caused serious damage to the sparsely populated Juan Fernandez islands, off the Santiago coast, local radio reported.

Carmen Fernandez, the head of Chile’s emergency services, said at least 52 people died. President Michelle Bachelet has declared a “state of catastrophe” in the country. The quake hit near the town of Maule, 200 miles southwest of Santiago, at a depth of 22 miles underground. The epicentre was just 70 miles from Concepcion, Chile’s second-largest city, where more than 200,000 people live along the Bio Bio river. In Santiago buildings collapsed and phone lines and electricity were brought down, but the full extent of the damage is still being determined.

Santiago resident Simon Shalders said: “There was a lot of movement. The houses were really shaking, walls were moving backwards and forwards, and doors were swinging open. “The power is still out here. There’s quite a few choppers flying around in Santiago I suppose checking out the worst-affected areas.” In the coastal city of Vina del Mar, the earthquake struck just as people were leaving a disco, Julio Alvarez told a local radio station. “It was very bad, people were screaming, some people were running, others appeared paralyzed. I was one of them.”

Several big aftershocks later hit the south-central region, including ones measuring 6.9, 6.2 and 5.6. The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center issued a warning for Chile and Peru, and a less-urgent tsunami watch for Ecuador, Colombia, Panama, Costa Rica and Antarctica. A spokesman said: “Sea level readings indicate a tsunami was generated. “It may have been destructive along coasts near the earthquake epicentre and could also be a threat to more distant coasts.”

The Joint Australian Tsunami Warning Center issued also warned of a “potential tsunami threat; to New South Wales state, Queensland state, Lord Howe Island and Norfolk Island”. Any potential wave would not hit Australia until Sunday morning local time, it added. Earthquakes are relatively common in Chile, which is part of the pacific “ring-of-fire” tectonic-plate boundary, and many buildings are built to withstand tremors. The largest earthquake ever recorded struck the same region on May 22, 1960. The magnitude-9.5 quake killed 1,655 people and left two million homeless. The tsunami that it caused killed people in Hawaii, Japan and the Philippines and caused damage to the US West Coast.

Five years after the massive Indian Ocean tsunami

Five years after the massive Indian Ocean tsunami, which left a devastating trail of death and destruction, millions of people have benefited from the influx of aid by rebuilding stronger infrastructure, social services and disaster warning systems than existed before the catastrophe, according to the United Nations agencies at the core of the recovery effort.The largest emergency relief response in history was prompted by the earthquake off the coast of the Indonesian island of Sumatra on 26 December 2004, which sent waves as high as 30 metres crashing into 14 countries, claiming nearly 230,000 lives and leaving around 2 million people homeless.The international community pledged over $14 billion in aid for the overall emergency relief and recovery operations, according to a recent UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) report summarizing the results of its programmes, which have received almost $700 million to date.

The report noted that communities whose livelihoods, homes, schools and heath facilities were destroyed have had opportunities to build back better health, education, water and sanitation services, as well as improve the security of areas vulnerable to natural disaster or violent conflict, and provide safer environments for vulnerable children.

For example, the UNICEF-supported Darusada Children’s Centre in Aceh – a region on the northern tip of Sumatra with the closest major population to the epicentre of the 2004 earthquake – opened in 2007 and currently serves around 120 children who have been orphaned, abandoned or sexually assaulted.In addition, the court house in the regional capital Banda Aceh has added a juvenile court which is presided over by a judge who has been given special training by UNICEF. Changes in the juvenile justice system in Indonesia were also adopted after the tsunami to strengthen child protection provisions.

The UNICEF report noted that the unparalleled international response to the tsunami created a unique opportunity to bolster the peace process between the Government of Indonesia and the separatist Free Aceh Movement which resulted in the signing of a peace agreement in 2005 after 70 years of conflict.

Recovery efforts in Thailand have been instrumental in building a model Child Protection Monitoring System, which was initially established in 2007 to identify and monitor children orphaned by the tsunami, as well as other at-risk children.The report also underscored some of the lessons learned from the relief and recovery operations, with efforts in Myanmar positively influencing preparedness and response to other emergency situations. Following Cyclone Mala and other emergencies in 2006, as well as Cyclone Nargis in 2008, for example, UNICEF was able to swiftly mobilize and deliver emergency relief supplies, including family and child survival kits, insecticide treated bednets, and essential drugs for local health centres, in the affected areas.

In the Maldives, all the houses on the island of Dhuvaafaru are newly built, and construction to defend against rising sea-levels is ongoing. After years spent in temporary settlements on other islands, Dhuvaafaru has been transformed into a new home for an entire community displaced from nearby Kandholhudhoo by the tsunami, but with 4,060 people living in 600 homes, around 80 more houses need to be built.Expanded social services are also helping to protect and promote children’s right in the Maldives, and a UNICEF-backed non-governmental organization (NGO) is at the heart of the fight against the growing problem of intravenous drug use among adolescents since the tsunami.

UNICEF noted that recovery programmes in some countries have now drawn to a close, with continuing projects handed over to the national authorities or integrated into existing programmes carried out by the UNICEF country offices. Due to the scale of the recovery required in Indonesia and Sri Lanka, the agency said it will continue to support reconstruction activities through the end of 2010.

The UN Development Programme (UNDP) has highlighted the power of community involvement in the reconstruction process, with shopkeepers, fishermen and women getting together to plan and build their new homes.“There was a great rush to get people back into permanent housing, but that rush could create problems, preventing a meaningful discussion with people and with the communities,” said UNDP Deputy Resident Representative for Thailand Hakan Bjorkman.“It took a little bit longer but the results were much better, and this is the essence of the ‘build back better’ concept – to have people involved in their reconstruction,” said Mr. Bjorkman.

UNDP noted that since the tsunami governments, international agencies and civil society organizations have banded together to construct 250,000 permanent houses, over 100 air and seaports, thousands of schools and hospitals, as well as create national and regional tsunami warning systems by placing early detection buoys in the Indian Ocean.

In collaboration with other UN agencies, national and international organizations and in cooperation with the Discovery Channel, UNDP has made a documentary telling the story of how community engagement has been successful in the mending and rebuilding lives affected by the tsunami in the hardest-hit areas of Indonesia, India, Sri Lanka, Thailand and the Maldives.The film shows that many formerly marginalized groups are playing increasingly more significant roles in their communities as a result of recovery initiatives, such as job training for women in fish processing, as well as marketing and business.