“It
was severe…every single building collapsed in our little
town.” says Ejaz Ahmed Khan, a 52 year old Pakistan Red
Crescent volunteer from the Harripur branch.
On October 8, an hour after the disaster, he rushed to the mosque
of a nearby town, where people were praying in silence. He made
a public appeal to the people there and organized the community
leaders to get together and help the others in need.
“In the early stages of the earthquake everybody was in
shock. There was an eerie silence in the mosque. They sat desperately
praying. I saw the hardiest of men crying like children. I reached
out to them and appealed to the community leaders and other
individuals in the town to start working to save lives.”
With eight years of experience as a volunteer coordinator, Ahmed
Khan was able to organize over a hundred people within a few
hours.
“We mobilized them to search and rescue those people that
were trapped under the rubble. At the same time we started to
collect blankets, clothes and food from the community. Within
those first critical hours we gave all we could to those most
desperately in need. Time was running out and the night was
fast approaching. As we were the only ones on the ground before
the others arrived, we had to react immediately and efficiently”
“The sense of community was overwhelming. The housewives
were our volunteer relief distributors and worked with us tirelessly
during the first couple of days. We soon started to dispatch
the injured people to the nearby hospitals in Abbottabad and
Mansehra. The sheer number of injured was beyond belief”
said Ahmed .
Although the hectic first month of the disaster is over, Ahmed
Khan still works around the clock.
He is now with the International Federation’s Regional
Disaster Response Teams (RDRTs) conducting the “needs
assessment” in the mountainous areas where relief is only
just arriving.
Jim Stevenson, the relief delegate leading the air operation
explained that: “We are using UN helicopters to drop our
specially trained and fully equipped teams into rugged mountain
areas to carry out assessments and relief distributions. The
teams hike up to 20 km a day from village to village where they
often spend the night. They are composed of volunteers from
Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies from Malaysia, Laos, Philippines
and Pakistan. Relief supplies are then quickly flown in for
the teams to hand them over to village councils or elders who
are the community leaders. It’s a challenging task and
time is of the essence as winter sets in. Thousands of people
are scattered throughout hundreds of villages.”
The relief air operations are distributing relief and shelter
items such as tents, blankets, tarpaulins, water containers
and hygiene kits. In addition very soon specially developed
winterized tents with wood or kerosene stoves and repair tool
kits for damaged homes will be delivered.
Before going to another air operation with the newly assigned
RDRTs, Stevenson makes his final statement: “as tough
as these hardy and proud people are, the tears in the eyes of
their weathered faces convey their true feelings and inspire
us to continue our efforts.”
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Ejaz
Ahmed Khan, a 52 year old Pakistan Red Crescent volunteer
(p13602)
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Jim
Stevenson, the relief delegate leading the air operation.
(p13606)
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Stevenson
makes his final statement: “as tough as these hardy
and proud people are, the tears in the eyes of their weathered
faces convey their true feelings and inspire us to continue
our efforts.” (p13607)
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"We
soon started to dispatch the injured people to the nearby
hospitals in Abbottabad and Mansehra"(p13609)
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