Emergency relief in Peru for earthquake survivors
21/08/2007
Last week’s earthquake in Peru, which measured 7.9 on the Richter scale, has claimed over 500 lives and thousands more homeless. Emergency relief operations were quickly underway, rescuing victims trapped under buildings and providing survivors with shelter, food and medicine, with crowds of residents in the affected areas desperately waiting for support. SOS Children was quick to provide support but the needs of people are simply beyond imagination.
After a team of SOS Children co-workers carried out an assessment of the situation in some of the most badly affected areas, a second team travelled to the town of Santa Barbara, Cañete, on Saturday where they began providing blankets, food, water and medicines to over 100 quake-hit families. The town is located about 100 metres from the sea shores where about 80 percent of the houses have collapsed.
"The situation in the area is chaotic," reports Sainot Gallegos, a member of the SOS team working in the area. "People have no fresh water, no electricity. Several schools have collapsed and the aid is nowhere near sufficient. Trucks carrying aid supplies are being stopped in the middle of the road and are forced to give out their contents to the hundreds of victims on the way. The situation is making it impossible to reach the remote areas where people have so far received no support. No-one has a clear idea of the situation in the remote villages, but one thing we know for sure is that these people will have to wait even longer for help to arrive. In Pisco, the most devastated city, the situation is even worse. The town looks like it’s been hit by bombs. The number of dead bodies, being taken out from among the wreckage the whole day long, has reached the hundreds.”
Cooperative work with other institutions and organisations is still difficult, because the access to the quake-hit areas is hard and dangerous. SOS Children has therefore been organizing more relief convoys, which are slowly reaching the affected areas. More camps are planned to be opened during the following days.
In Lima the situation is critical, too. Schools have been closed, telephone services have been restricted, and in some parts of the city (Callao, Chorillos, and Rimac) electricity has not been restored yet. According to police reports over a hundred families spent the first few nights after the quake out in the open, fearing the collapse of their precarious shelters’ roofs.
"Among the main necessities are fresh water, warm clothes, medical aid, and food supplies," remarks Sainot. "The temperature during the night is dreadfully cold and most families are sleeping in the open, fearing another earth tremor anytime."
Fortunately, the nearby SOS Children’s Villages in Lima (Zarate, Rio Hondo, and Callao) and Huancayo were not damaged, although the tremors from the quake were felt in these areas and were extremely terrifying, especially for the children.
Relevant Countries: Peru.