The reporting from NPR this morning was just horrifying. (I mean the conditions on the scene, not the quality of the actual reporting.) I mean... listening to this woman, you began to worry if she would get out of there alive. No sources of water & emerging chaos. The dead were everywhere. I've never heard anything exactly like it, outside of fiction.
This is going to be with us for quite some time. Please consider giving to an established relief organization. Mrs. rimrocker and I are sending our first contribution to the United Methodist Committee on Relief. If you reference Advance # 418325 on your check, 100% of your money will go to the Haiti emergency. Or, you can make an online contribution. Here's a link: http://secure.gbgm-umc.org/donations/umcor/donate.cfm?code=418325&id=3018760
i can't even fathom how much food/water it takes to cover 3 million people for a day let alone an extended period. it's beyond the intellectual capacity of my brain. seems like a lot.
Donated some money too , asked around some average american and it seemed they dont give a **** because its haiti , just shows how ignorant most Americans are. Over 50k ppl are dead and most americans dont even care . Sad Sad
Logistics will be a b****. Most likely bottled water and MRE's at first. Figure a minimum of 2 MRE's and a liter of water per day per person x 3,000,000 x number of days (2 weeks at least before they can provide better food) = 84 million MREs and 42 million liters of water. The water alone will weigh over 92 million pounds. (I think there's a civilian version of MREs for disasters, but I don't remember any details.)
there's a story out right now on how credit card companies are making a killing skimming fees off of credit card donations.
Well that makes me glad I mailed a check in. Anyway I'm also guessing the phone companies are making some money off of the text donations.
They probably have liners and such that might work, but the problem is distribution. How do you pump it out of the tanker and put it in the hands of people efficiently? Better to use a ship to transport bottled water, as that delivers both water and a container that can be given to individuals.
Or one of these(if it ever made it out of the lab): M3 mobile water desalination system This dude has a good write up on water solutions: Water for Haiti: Now
I went ahead and texted "Haiti" to 90999. Wish I could donate more, this is a terrible tragedy. Just heartbreaking watching the evening news tonight.
I suppose this is not exactly on topic, but the US needs a civilian version of the old MAC. I realize we are limited by runway space in this case, but 100 c-17's or maybe buying up surplus 747 cargo planes would be a good idea. Or, maybe we are done having massive disasters.
The US is sending a marine expeditionary unit, which comes with a couple of warships. The largest ship should be able to desalinate a couple hundred thousand gallons of water each day and deliver to where its needed with its own helicopters. The US did the same with aircraft carriers during the Tsunami a couple years ago.
Just texted "Haiti" to 90999. I'm not going to miss out on the biggest mobile text relief effort in history. Screw that...I'm there! Last I heard, it was at five million dollars and growing. Who's next? Get er done!
I get some of that feeling as well. I emailed my team of coworkers trying to get them to donate. Noone except my boss even bothered to reply. I don't know what they are doing? Do they care? I have no idea.
Americans generally open their wallets to help others more than most globally, according to a report I read a few years back. People are hurting right now, one person in the family could be unemployed making it difficult to donate. Plus many don't like donating at work since they've already paid their dues when off work. Nobody likes to make a scene about it...........my 2 cents.
