What do we do as individuals in response to distress calls?

I have been in communications with many friends and colleagues who naturally wanted to spring into action at the news that Haiti had indeed weathered great damage following the battering by tropical storms Fay, Gustav, Hanna and Ike. As in 2004, Gonaives became a muddy lake that trapped more than 250,000 people in a deathly grip.

Hello, Tamara… Please Don’t Let Me Down!

Fond des Blancs activists Canes and Marie-Therese Maignan who have been involved with the county’s children’s rights committee have been deeply affected by the storms that battered Haiti in the country’s south. It’s hard to imagine that a worse fate could have fallen onto their shoulders as they were barely unable to make ends meet while struggling for social change in their community.

In flooded Haitian city, `Every home is a shelter’ - 09/11/2008 - MiamiHerald.com

In flooded Haitian city, `Every home is a shelter’
Posted on Thu, Sep. 11, 2008
Associated Press

ARIANA CUBILLOS/AP PHOTO
A woman reacts as flood victims line up to received food from UN peacekeepers in Gonaives, Haiti, Thursday
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GONAIVES, Haiti –
In a cathedral surrounded by mud and flood waters, the 34-year-old motorcycle taxi driver shivers on a pew, [...]

In an Emergency, Stick to the Cuny Principles

Fred Cuny was a disaster relief professional who specialized in out-of-the-box thinking. Cuny disappeared several years ago while on mission in Kosovo. The following principles are taken from a book which he authored called “Famine, Conflict and Response, A Basic Guide.”