A major earthquake rocked Haiti on Tuesday, killing possibly thousands of people as it toppled the presidential palace and hillside shanties alike, leaving the poor Caribbean nation appealing for international help.
A five-story United Nations building was also brought down by the 7-magnitude quake, the most powerful to hit Haiti in more than 200 years according to the United States Geological Survey.
Reuters television footage from the capital, Port-au-Prince, showed scenes of chaos on the streets with people sobbing and appearing dazed amid the rubble.
The quake’s epicentre was only 16km from Port-au-Prince, which has a population of about one million, and aftershocks as powerful as 5,9 rattled the city throughout the night and into Wednesday. Reports on casualties and damage were slow to get out of Haiti due to communication problems.
As the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, Haiti is ill-equipped to respond to such a disaster.
“I am appealing to the world, especially the United States, to do what they did for us back in 2008 when four hurricanes hit Haiti,” Raymond Alcide Joseph, Haiti’s ambassador to Washington, said in a CNN interview.
“At that time the US dispatched … a hospital ship off the coast of Haiti. I hope that will be done again … and help us in this dire situation that we find ourselves in. I’m asking the Haitians who are abroad to work together and bring all the effort in a concerted manner to help those back home.”
Sara Fajardo, a spokesperson for Catholic Relief Services, told the Los Angeles Times that its representative in Haiti said the death toll could be in the thousands.
US organising response
US President Barack Obama said his “thoughts and prayers” were with the people of Haiti and pledged immediate aid. A late-night White House meeting involving various arms of the government was held to coordinate the US response.
The Inter-American Development Bank said it would provide $200 000 in immediate emergency aid. The World Bank, which said its local offices were destroyed but that most staff were accounted for, plans to send a team to help Haiti assess damage and plan a recovery.
The US Coast Guard in Miami said it had mobilised cutters and aircraft to positions close to Haiti to give humanitarian assistance as needed.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy’s office said in a statement on Wednesday France was sending rescue services to help operations in Haiti and find French citizens there.
The quake hit at 5pm local time and witnesses reported people screaming “Jesus, Jesus” running into the streets as offices, hotels, houses and shops collapsed. Experts said the quake’s epicentre was very shallow at a depth of only 10km, which was likely to have magnified the destruction.
The presidential palace lay in ruins, its domes fallen on top of flattened walls. CNN reported on its website that Haitian Ambassador Joseph said President Rene Preval was safe, but gave no further details.
Bloodied and dazed survivors gathered in the open and corpses were pinned by debris.
“The whole city is in darkness. You have thousands of people sitting in the streets with nowhere to go,” said Rachmani Domersant, an operations manager with the Food for the Poor charity. “There are people running, crying, screaming.”
Little help for victims
In the hillside neighbourhood of Petionville, Domersant said he saw no police or rescue vehicles.
“People are trying to dig victims out with flashlights,” he said. “I think hundreds of casualties would be a serious understatement.”
Witnesses said they saw homes and shanties built on hillsides come tumbling down as the earth shook.
“The car was bouncing off the ground,” Domersant said.
UN officials said normal communications had been cut off and the only way to talk with people on the ground was via satellite phone. Roads were blocked by rubble.
UN peacekeeping chief Alain Le Roy said the main UN building in Port-au-Prince had collapsed. “We don’t know how many people were in the building,” he told reporters.
About 9 000 UN police and troops are stationed there to maintain order and many countries were trying to determine the welfare of their personnel.
France’s Minister for Cooperation, Alain Joyandet, said on French radio the Hotel Montana had collapsed and that about 100 of its 300 guests had been evacuated.
Le Roy’s deputy, Edmond Mulet, said 200 to 250 people worked in the collapsed UN building during normal hours.
There were more houses destroyed than standing in Delmas Road, a major thoroughfare in Port-au-Prince, another Food for the Poor employee said. — Reuters