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Mission Travel Diary Tsunami Mission 2005 Monday January 10, 2005
Tuesday January 11, 2005 From: Brian The morning briefing, originally scheduled for 8am, was moved to 10am. Not all members got the word of the change, so it was decided 10am would be the time every morning while in Charlotte. Today’s news was that Paramedics for Children had covered the nearly $9k expecting to be reimbursed by the Egyptian government (who was funding the team’s travel expenses from their relief fund). Rodger had been assured the money would come, but until it did, they would not book the flights from Charlotte. The remainder of Tuesday was spent figuring out what supplies would need to be purchased and things like that. Tuesday’s lunch was provided by Mayflower restaurant in Rock Hill. Back at the hotel, the first of a lot of news coverage occurred (organized by Charlotte Support Team member, and PFC co-founder, Roz Morton) Tuesday evening, we threw an event for the public to meet the team at Millirons in Charlotte. The Rum Punch Bandits donated their time and played 2 sets. The Carolina Tailgate Party recorded the show for a future airing on Radio Margaritaville (airs week of Jan 31st). The team had a great time and all expenses were paid by donations from Carolina Tailgate listeners. Wednesday January 12, 2005 From: Brian At the 10am briefing, there were still doubts about whether the money would be coming from the Egyptian government and the outgoing tickets had not been purchased. At this point, the mood went from excitement and readiness to concern over whether they would even go and a lot of frustration. We ran some errands to pick up more supplies. Lunch was provided by Stacy’s Bistro in Rock Hill. Rodger received an e-mail from Stefan (the person on the ground in Indonesia who was preparing their arrival). It told them that there were supplies on the ground, and a French team who were waiting to be relieved. It was a promising email for the team as they now knew the details were still set once they got to Indonesia. Now the only problem was getting there. They team also saw their first bit of press coverage. As the day wore on with little progress, the team decided that they needed to remain in the hotel and begin coming up with other options to go if they were going. Dinner that night was provided by Pizza Hut at the hotel. Thursday January 13, 2005 From: Brian The 10am briefing was the low point of the week. The Egyptian government had withdrawn their support of the team. Now the charity was out 9 grand, and they needed $40k to get to Indonesia. The group went into brainstorming mode as they started looking for alternate funding. Here we have a team of 16 medical/rescue professionals, sitting in a hotel ready to go. There are supplies, medicines, and organization on the ground in Indonesia as well as a team there who were exhausted and waiting to be relieved, but there was no way to get the team over there. As the day wore on, the governments of Canada and the U.S. were all contacted at various levels, all of the major charities and relief organizations were contacted, people contacted media back home, the breakfast nook at Sleep Inn became a War Room with laptops and cell phones constantly in use. Ron Wike, member of the Charlotte Support Team, described it perfectly saying it looked and sounded like a telemarketing firm or customer support line with everyone talking. Dinner that night was provided by Wild Wing Café in Charlotte. We worked out rooms for the extra night with the hotels, everything was still on hold. Friday January 14, 2005 From: Brian On the way to the briefing that morning, we were notified that the Holiday Inn Express corporate office wouldn’t extend the donated rooms any longer. We shuffled some folks around and team members paid for 3 rooms out of their pockets to be able to stay in the room and work on the immediate effort instead of packing. The staff at the hotel, including Sanjay the GM, were great and even tried to help us contact other hotels, however I personally was very disappointed in the Holiday Inn corporate office. The Sleep Inn extended the rooms for one more night. On top of this, the van we had rented needed to be back by 3pm as it had already been rented to someone else. We contacted Karen Smith at Triangle Rent-A-Car (who had contacted Brian, but after we had already secured the van from U-Save). Triangle graciously donated another van for us to use to get the team around. At the 10am briefing, it was decided that they would draw the line today. If there were no leads and no money to get them overseas, they would call the effort off that afternoon and plan flights home on Saturday. The mood was grim at times and hopeful at other times. The stress level among the team was high, tho many wouldn’t show it. It would seem a shame to not go at this point. What would happen to the team that was there already? What would happen to the supplies? What would happen with the PR fallout now that we had promoted this, danced in front of the news, etc? The charity was out 9k from their school supply fund in Honduras… There was a lot of uncertainty. By Friday afternoon, the team had found the funds from various places. Paramedics for Children had all but drained their reserves, team members had contacted churches, friends, and family back home and had money donated. Independence Air helped the team out with flights to Newark airport where Malaysian Airlines would be waiting to take them to Indonesia. By 5pm, the team was officially going. Will McElveen prepared a home-cooked meal and brought that to the hotel that night. A Local news station, NBC 6, arrived to cover the story. A guy that worked in the hotel, Yefry (I hope I spelled that right), had been there cleaning every morning during the briefings. We had met him and found he was from Indonesia. All week, he had been around, all smiles, asking what we had been up to that day, all in all a real nice guy. That night, he brought some friends over who had lost loved ones in Indonesia. These folks wanted to tell the team Thank You. The fact that they arrived while the news was there was either coincidence or miraculous, take your pick. The news interviewed these folks and they told their stories of what they had heard and lost in the Tsunamis. That story was a feature story on the news that night. After the news folks had left, and the team had heard these guys’ stories, it became very, very real what they were about to do. Everyone was now very focused on the task at hand. “Bags in the lobby by 7:30am” was the call, and everyone went to pack. Saturday January 15, 2005 From: Brian We picked up the team from the hotels to go to the airport. It took a Yukon, an Explorer, and a mini-van to carry just the gear. The team crowded into the 15-passenger van donated by Triangle rent-a-car and headed for the airport. Once there, we dropped off the team, got all of the gear checked on Independence Air, said our good-byes, and they were on their way. Blair Miller, a member of the team, is now the contact for status reports after they left. Jennifer Van Wie is stateside and compiles the reports from Blair. He will be calling Jennifer only two times a day between 8:30 – 9:30 AM and 8:30 –9:30 PM eastern standard time. He said that he will only speak maybe two minutes and will be giving me a very brief update of what is going on over there. They do have a satellite phone and hopefully they will be able to give us some contact. Because they are concerned about running down the battery on the phones they ask that Jennifer be your voice and ears as they can not man the phones except in a very small window of time. We will post updates on the Carolina Tailgate Party Web site as well. Saturday January 15, 2005 8:27 PM Eastern Standard Time: 1st update From: Jennifer Blair Miller reports that, they arrived at Newark New Jersey airport at approximately 3:00 PM. They were met by an executive from the Malaysian airlines, who came in from Washington DC. He hand delivered their airplane tickets and made arrangements for them to stay in a special section in the air Malaysian executive lounge. They will depart 10:00PM eastern standard time and fly to Stockholm, Sweden where they will have an hour lay over and then they will fly on to Kuala Limpur, Malaysia and then to Medan, Indonesia. While in the executive lounge the team had a command meeting where they structured the team in readiness for when they land in Medan. One half of the team will validate their mission. The other half of the team will validate their lodging to be sure that it is safe and secure and they will also check with the US military to see if lodging would be safer or more appropriate. They will then rest and have their next briefing. Blair said that they would more than likely not be in contact with us until they reach Medan and not to be worried. They still have 12 hours to Stockholm and 21 hours from there to Medan. Please, be patient and try not to worry because once they get into Medan they are going to be in what is called a black zone. That means that telephone and Internet is not available. They must use their satellite phone and if they have problems with charging it then the regular check in times maybe extended. I will keep you up to date as soon as I get any information. I feel really good about this team they work really well together and are up for this mission. Blair Miller, Rodger Harrison and Kirk Mahon all said that everyone is in good spirits and are very excited about going. They should have plenty of rest while they are in route. They are ready to do what they are trained to do . . .save lives. Sunday January 16, 2005 10:00pm Eastern Standard Time From Jennifer: I have not had an official up date from the team but I heard from Rodger Harrison around 7:00 PM EST and they had landed in Kaula Limpur Malaysia they were at the airport and still had another two hours to travel to Medan Indonesia. I had only about 1 minute to talk to him so I don't know how long the lay over was there. They are all fine and in good spirits. I have not had an official update yet from Blair Miller yet but if they have landed, they are probably getting to the hotel and getting settled. Again I must emphasis that information may be slow. Sunday January 16 2005 11:35pm est From: Jennifer Blair Miller called me at 11:35 PM EST. The team arrived in Medan Indonesia about an hour ago. It is January 17th and 11:42 AM there. They have not had a chance yet to talk with anyone in the consulate but are getting settled and organized. The worst thing that has happened so far is that they are missing two bags and the airport is looking for them. Blair will be calling me tomorrow morning at 10:00 AM and will be giving me another update. The satellite phone worked beautifully. He said everyone is doing very well. Monday January 17 2005 11:45am est From: Jennifer Good morning, I just heard from Blair Miller and he reports that They are all jet lagged and are preparing to rest. They surprisingly had no issues getting through customs with all of the medicines that they brought with them. They did meet with the proper Indonesian and other government officials and had their permit to enter the country re-validated. All papers and permits are in order. The Bureaucratic problems are challenging and the members of the team that handles logistics spent the entire day working on bureaucratic red tape and their mission. There is still some confusion in the main command post about who should do what and when: however the logistics team members stayed at it all day until they received all of the information and direction they needed. The Team met up with Stephan Templeton who is their advance contact man and had an excellent briefing. He gave them a detailed report of where they are going and what they can expect. It is going to be a very hard mission. Tomorrow part of the team will be picked up by helicopter and at this time the team is not sure which government will be doing the transport (Perhaps French Military, Malaysian seal team, or US Military) Two members of the team left with Stephan Templeton to go to the main command center to try to put their choice in for location. They will be sending the team via helicopter to the south of Banda Aceh. It was devastated by 7 Tsunami waves and the area was hardest hit--even more than than Banda Aceh. This is a very remote area. The weather in the area is hot, humid and raining. The temperature is in the upper 90’s and they have been told that they can expect temperatures between 100-105 degrees in the areas where they will be transported. The Paramedics for Children team will be relieving a French team and will be working out of a hospital there. Then a select advance group chosen from our team will be picked up by helicopter and be flown into the remote regions--primary objective is to vaccinate as many people as they can for tetanus and of course to give medical assistance where needed. I will try to find out from Blair tonight who is the logistic team members, the members that will be at the hospital and which members will be on the advance missions into the region. I asked Blair if all of the team members had the proper vaccinations and he said yes, plus they are taking pills for malaria. So I feel like the team is very protected from any diseases that are indigenous to the area and situation. The two missing bags are still missing and the Malaysian airlines think they know where they are and are trying to get back to them. I don’t know who’s they are but the search goes on. Hopefully, they will get them to them soon. The up side is the Hotel is very comfortable and the food is good. Everyone is healthy and well. I think everyone is resting now so that they will be ready for tomorrow’s challenges. I also thought you might want to see a newscast by channel 14 News. Click on this link and you will see the interview prior to them leaving. http://www.news14charlotte.com/content/local_news/?ArID=83987&SecID=2 I hope to get another report tonight at 10:00 PM EST. Monday January 17 2005 10:00pm est Good evening Family and friends It is 10:00 PM EST Blair just checked in and he reports that: They are in the process of moving out of the hotel and traveling on. They are expected to stay at or around the hospital there. They will assign a team once on the ground to concentrate on shelter water and food. Unicef is expected to provide some support for the team while they are there. Even though the group is focusing on logistics, it maybe nothing more than checking in with Unicef and Unicef may say you can pitch your tents right here. Blair is not sure if they will be in a building or tents. The Singapore Armed Forces will be flying them by helicopter. They will be leaving in about two hours. They will be keeping their rooms so if you call and they say they are not there and have not checked out. Please don’t worry. I will let you know when they travel back there. One thing that went wrong is the bags were not found and one team member had to go buy clothes. Yes both bags belonged to one person… What has been going right? They have made multiple points of contacts with the UN Joint logistic Center and they have attended the combined NGO briefing meeting. Jeff Wooden and Blair Miller are on their way over to the US Consulate for a security briefing before leaving for Meulaboh. Tomorrow they are expecting a small detachment from their team to travel further north. It is right on the coast. For those of you that have maps there are two islands right off the coast of Sumatra that was totally devastated and the military isn’t there in much force yet much less aid. The situation there is listed as very dire. However, going there is not a definite--if they do go it will be a contingent from their team, 5 or 6 people. Their assignment is the Municipal Hospital so all may opt to stay and work in the hospital and not go further north. The situation with the government has been very positive. They have encountered no security problems. The team has been received with the utmost graciousness. The main concern that the team has been dealing with was the logistics of getting stuff done and it’s happening and that is really good news. From the time that the team made the decision to no wait on the Newmont Mining Company to make things happen and to put it all together for themselves--they continued on with that operating model and that has continued to prove successful. Blair stated that they have a really strong team and everybody is doing their part. He also stated that everyone was feeling well and ready to proceed. Tuesday January 18 2005 10am est Good Morning family and friends I hope that you slept well. I want you all to know that I am late getting this information out to you use because I have so many calls from people that are all over the country that have found out about this relief team. These people are so very proud of our family members and what they are accomplishing. Paramedics for Children may be a small relief team of 16 people there but their sacrifices and hard work over there are greatly respected and appreciated. This proves that we can all make a difference even if it is one person at a time. I am going typing what I recorded from Blair’s conversation with me. Blair Miller called at 9:30 AM EST Blair Miller said One half of the team deployed, the other half of the team had to stay behind in Medan, Indonesia because we were over weight for the helicopter and they could only take eight of us. The other half of the team will arrive at 8:30 tomorrow morning local time. On the helicopter ride up here we got to see the devastation and it is pretty amazing. It is hard to really describe it over the telephone. People are in a world of hurt here. We think that this will be a worthwhile mission from everything that we have seen. The team that is up here is involved in and has been briefed on doing measles vaccines. The intent is to vaccinate 50,000 children for measles. They have it down to a science –the children come in--we give them a vitamin A tablet--they then come over and have a shot for measles. The child is told that they are going to get a piece of candy. When the child gets their shot, the child starts crying and then they quickly pop a piece of sour candy in the child’s mouth which immediately stops the child from coughing and then they paint the child’s pinky finger nail with finger nail polish to let them know which child has been vaccinated and which has not. It is really fascinating how they have that working. The team is involved in the vaccination program. The rest of the team will arrive tomorrow morning 8:30(AM Local time) when we hook up with them; we will have a briefing at 10:00 AM. The entire 16-member team, with the Indonesian Military, will travel 40 kilometers north into the seriously affected areas. We will be providing the medical assistance-- probably the first medical assistance--that the people have seen since the tsunami came through. We did hear one amazing story –a mother at the French hospital camp that we are at gave birth to two children, a little boy and a little girl the day after the Tsunami and she has named them. Tsunami (little boy) and Tsunama (little girl). Apparently Tsunami is a word for strength. I asked Blair about the vaccines for tetanus and were they going to do that too? Blair said, we are just doing the measles. There is a problem getting the tetanus in here because the Indonesians recently passed a law that says only tetanus vaccine that can be used are those that have been manufactured in Indonesia. The USS Lincoln has 40,000 units of tetanus vaccine sitting on their deck waiting for permission to bring it on site. The official death toll here—the visual count in just Indonesia is currently-- this morning--113,000 for Indonesia alone. They strongly expect the death toll for Indonesia to go to 200,000. Things here are going well--logistics are always difficult but we have an excellent logistic team and we are getting over the hurdles. The team that is doing forward deployment is in very good spirits. The names of the Forward Team are: Blair Miller, Mike Geddes, Dr.Kirk Mahon, Beth Burkhart, Bret and Brenda Davidson and Steve Malone. The rest of the crew will fly in via Chanukah(Please forgive my spelling) helicopter tomorrow morning and is meeting us at 8:30 AM Local time--Rodger Harrison, Pam Cox, Rodney Ward, Trudi Kayana, Jeffrey Wooden, Pui Mung Wong, Michaela Pelescakova, James Garcia, and Angela Fusaro. I asked him how the lodging was for the team. Blair said that the lodgings are here tonight and we are staying at the Unicef headquarters. We have food and we are actually having a cup tea in a local restaurant at this very moment. Blair said that if any of you guys have any questions he can entertain 2 or three questions since he is sure that family is curious about what is going on there. So if you like, you can e-mail me a question and I will ask him. Of course if you all have questions just know that I will have to choose 2 or 3 from them and ask him on his next call scheduled for tomorrow morning. I asked what are you guys experiencing there? Blair said –just realizing the incredible poverty in the area. We are extremely safe and everyone in the forward team can tell you that they are being received with open arms. I asked him, how did your meeting go with the US Consulate go? Wonderful meeting, basically, the security briefing was that there are no problems there and has been no problems. There are political issues at play and they ask us to make sure that we spread the word that the Unite States are not going to be here for an extended period of time and that we are not going to try and take orphaned children out of the country. Those are the two greatest concerns of the locals here and they have been getting some rather poor press about that topic . We are trying to support them on that. The customs are not an issue as everyone recognizes that we are westerns and are fully embracing us. Nobody has any problems. He said he had to run and I told him . I want to tell him that all of your family and friends are back here waiting for you guys to come home and they following every single movement that you are making--so take care of yourselves and watch each other’s back He said would do that and that is the end of the phone call. There will not be an update tonight and he will contact me between tomorrow morning 10:00 and 10:30 AM EST. I am recording the conversation so please be patient as I am not the fastest typist and certainly no the best speller..... Wednesday January 19 2005 11:00am From: Jennifer Good morning family and friends I hope you slept well. I will try to type in the conversation. Blair’s words are in black my response is in Blue. Their mission has changed somewhat as you will read. Hello Blair good morning how are you all doing? Were are doing great, we have the whole team up today so the entire team is now back together again…a major mile stone for us. Copy? COPY While the 2nd team was on their way from Medan, the first team moved forward to a new town- We have a clinic here in a camp that is in that town that has about 1400 displaced families -- mostly children that are orphaned. In this clinic that we have set up--we have already treated a number of patients. I don’t have a number to give you but we have seen everything –mostly infections that we have been treating by antibiotics. We have already had one case of tuberculosis today. Copy? COPY We have water –we have food—we have shelter. Conditions are very rugged. The water that we have is for drinking only its difficult to get a shower and to feel clean at the end of the shower. The most important thing is not only have we been treating people, but also that we have made a lot people feel good just by our presence here. Everyone on the team is feeling very positive. Copy? COPY The things that have gone wrong--life here is extremely rugged that has been the biggest issue-- I don’t want to call that wrong but it is extremely hot here. The humidity is 98 to 99 % humidity all day with the temperature at or above100 degree fahrenheit. We do have food and everything but again that is rugged. The food that we are eating is MREs and just drinking bottled water. There are no other resources that are available –people are just making do. Copy? COPY Things--that are going right. We have electricity most of the time at night and that was something that we were not expecting. The other thing is all of the logistics. The second team was scrubbed from coming on time when their helicopter was taken by the Prime Minister of Singapore instead of our team to go on a sight seeing tour of Sumatra. Our logistics specialist, Jeff Wooden was able to get the team on a second flight that arrived in town here at about 4:00 in the afternoon—so everything worked out just fine. Tomorrow the team is going to focus on medical assistance for the hundreds of children here –it is going to be very grim--the most difficulties that we are experiencing is the need for interpreters--.we have a hand full of interpreters –and we are finding that interpreters are only good for about two hours—they are saying –that it is so mentally draining that they have to take an extended break for many hours so that will be our challenge there…The other thing is we may break a smaller team out to go out into other villages to vaccinate for measles and to do front line medical care for broken bones and that sort of thing--if they present themselves. Copy? COPY Two interesting notes the TNI which is the military here have been extremely gracious to us and appreciate our presence. We are actually on one of their military bases. We have an excellent report so our security is just fine. We are in concrete building. I don’t want anyone to worry about our security. An interesting antidote is the big buzz here from everyone on the team is-- have you seen the bats???? The bats here have a wingspan of a little more than three feet--they are flipping Huge! ( Blair says with humor )So it is the big thing they we all are talking about tonight is the Bats—it has sort of caught us all off guard. We have seen the goats—we have seen the oxen—we have seen the monkeys -- but the bats are absolutely huge. They make the eagles like we have in the United States look very very small. They are expecting some bad weather here but we are prepared for it. What time is it your time? It is 10:24 in the evening. This location is where we will be –this is our mission. We have made final arrangement for the 21st or the 22nd—that’s how it works here –you don’t get an exact time…so we will be sending either all or a portion of the team out of here on the 21st Did anyone have any question? Actually I didn’t have anybody write back any questions. I think you are pretty much covering everything that is a concern for everyone here. We are definitely in an incredible area where there is major devastation –it is pretty amazing. I am going to give you some statistics—it is sad statistics-- but it will give everyone an idea of the area that we are in. Meulaboh, was a town—I do not know the size of it but there were 32,000 people killed here.. Here is a sad statistic-- 45% percent of the people that lived in that town were children from ages 0-15. Since the Tsunami went through that percentage has now been estimated at 13% that are children that survived. It has also been determined that any child under the age of six or seven more than likely did not survive-- so there are very very, few small children left…. they did not have the ability to run away or gain higher ground…they couldn’t run fast enough…. They are expecting the lost of life to be a much as 200,000 in Indonesia alone. They are finding thousands and thousands of new bodies everyday…and we are definitely seeing that here copy? COPY…Are the bodies still lying about? No the bodies are not laying about –they have picked up most of the bodies but the bodies that were underneath rubble and that of thing have been marked with flags. Slowly but surely they will come back with bulldozers and removed the rubble and the bodies. As we drive down the road and you will eventually see them in our pictures--but as you drive down the road you see this terrible devastation an these flags hanging--telling you that there it a body under this and a body under that. Copy? Copy…how is the team doing Emotionally? The team emotionally is doing very good today. There are two reasons for that. First reason is our team is back together. That was very tough for half of the team to have to stay behind and the other team to move forward. It has been an incredible journey to be able to now be able to do the job that we were expecting to do back on the 10th…the other reason is theses kids are just neat—for those who have traveled to Honduras ( He is talking about the children that paramedics for children help)it has been described to me that these children are identical to the children in Honduras—you take their picture –they want to have their picture taken—they love people with digital cameras-- who will then show them the pictures through the digital camera and they crowd around 10 to 20 children at a time to see their picture…If you want get a huge cheer out of the crowd of children then all we have to do is use a video camera and video tape them for a few seconds and then show them the video. That brings huge cheers of joy to the children. So –how could the team not be in good spirits when you see these children –they all want to say hello to us—they all know the English word for hello and bye and as you drive down the road everyone waves to you. Children and adults alike--everyone…we really feel that by merely being present here we are making everyone feel better. Copy? COPY. That is wonderful ..All of you are doing such phenomenal work and our family and friends list is growing. People have found out about your team. The interest is growing like a grass fire….you have a lot of proud followers that are waiting for each update… While we were on the ground today we had a tremor or after shock--it was just a tremor we are on the ground in the bad area and you feel that sort of stuff. DO you have a safe place that you can get to if you have a major earthquake? We are in an area that was not affected by the tsunami at all so if there was a major earthquake, which would be highly unlikely, then we are in a safe location. Copy? Copy. We are just feeling the aftershocks and that is typical after having a major earthquake. We have experience our first one today and of course we are very close to the epicenter so, apparently they have had them before but we couldn’t feel them before …but where we are now, they can be felt…. and we are expecting to feel more but the likelihood of it being another 9.0 and causing an tsunami is NOT scientifically probable… We are very happy with what we have done today and we are looking forward to a very emotional day tomorrow as we start to see all of these children…. You guys are doing such fabulous work. I know that everybody here is just in awe of what you all are doing-- so impressed with the fact that you could get these major missions and get your team in and aligned with the government so that you get in there to do the work that you all wanted to do…Very impressive …you guys are a excellent team. We are all proud of you. Today is the first day that we gave ourselves high fives and said and we are now actually doing what we set off to do. It has been difficult…No single person did this…it has definitely been a team effort across the board--so we are very happy in that context and impressed of what we have pulled off as well…one thing that we found interesting is that there is so much control and bureaucracy in Indonesia for us to move about was harder then it was for us to come up with the funding to come over here--that is interesting in its own right…you have get permission from the TNI military to get into a region,,,, then you have to go into a county and then you have to get permission from that county government to operate there—then when you go into the town you have to get the permission from the people in that area to get permission to operate. Each one of these steps requires you to sit down and wait and talk with people to make sure they know who we are and why we are there and so forth—it has been an interesting challenge…Copy? Copy Ok very good, I will be talking with you tonight…. OK wonderful Take care Will do End of phone call. . . Wednesday January 19 2005 Blair called at 10:00 PM EST From: Jennifer I will not give a blow by blow like this morning, because the information is short. First of all I want to tell you all that the team is doing super! They are so very happy to be treating the people there and that has done so much to lift their spirits. As I said before they are taking care of 1400 people in a refugee camp in the county that I mentioned before. First part of the team does a general health check like taking their blood pressure and temperature and when the teams see that someone needs medical care, then the people are sent to the clinic where they are treated by the doctors and nurses. The process is somewhat slow due to the language barrier but they are expected to see one thousand patients today and Blair said that with this team, he thinks they will meet that goal. They hope to get the balance of the people tomorrow. They are treating the people for a lot of different things. They prescribe medicine when necessary. Some people were very dehydrated so they have to administer IVs before they can actually be treated. Everyone is doing fine and working really well together. Moral went from low to high the minute they started treating the many people in the camp. These warm and gracious people have affected all the team members, but the ones that have children of their own or have younger brothers and sister have been deeply touched by the children there. Their hearts have gone out to them and there have been some emotional moments. They are so honored to help and everyone is so appreciative. The team is physically well and they say a big hello--we miss you back home to their families. That is the phone call. I think that our team will need to sleep for a week when they get back. But even though they must be tired...I can hear a real purpose and sense of accomplishment in Blair's voice. They are doing what they set out to do and because of them 1400 people will be helped there. These people have had no medical help since December 26th when the tsunami when through. They were completely cut off. I can’t imagine what they had to deal with. Our little band of 16 relief workers are saving lives by getting the people vaccinated and helping the people who are sick and in need...I am just about as proud as a person can be.... I know it has been hard for you all waiting back home. I know you are worried, but what they are doing is historically humbling--in fact all of the relief workers from all of the counties are moving all cultural and political barriers to help these people and it is not because they are rich or because they are influential, it is because they are hurt and in dire need. Everyone has one mindset and that is to help. The whole globe cares and I don't know about you, but I think that humankind has finally awakened from a great apathetic sleep...this speaks of such global growth for humanity. You are doing your part to...by supporting their efforts. Each team member knows that you are here...waiting for each update and they know you care so very much...Thanks for all of your kind e-mails...I am honored to be your contact Until tomorrow, Rest well tonight…. All is well, Jennifer Hi family and friends! Good evening this is this morning’s update, please forgive me for getting this to you so late but I had a major paper due for my graduate course work. Also, I want to address one type-o-- that is when I wrote that their moral went from low to high….Oops…I meant that their Morale went from low to high….I saw it an started laughing … and thought oh great Jennifer that’s just great….that’s all I need is for someone to think their morals went form low to high…..at any rate…I am sorry. Please forgive this novice POC……Here goes the update. Update 8 Thursday January 20th 2005 10:00am Good morning how are you Very good OK-- we have been working in the clinic all day and treated many, many patients—I can’t give you the exact amount but everyone on the team is real happy the way things are going. Everything is very similar to the information that I communicated to you last night. We have sent two members of the team [out] to start on the process of negotiating the process of a flight out of here. We will not be able to do any transports tomorrow because it is a muslin holiday. We have been ask by the TNI to observe it. I then went to the NGO meeting that we are regularly asked to attend. And at the request of Unicef, we will also close the clinic until noon to observe the holiday tomorrow. Of course with the exception of emergency medical care. The reason is that Unicef and World Health Organization has been banned from this province of Indonesia for the past twenty years. They want to make sure that everyone that is providing humanitarian aid such as us is perceived as respecting the customs of the local people. It is an interesting holiday the town is lit up with candles. It is a holiday that the people reflect on the previous year and mend any problems that they have had with members of their family over a course of a year. It is interesting with all of that they have gone through--they are still able to celebrate their holidays. It’s neat. The town and everyone’s homes remind me of the lights like we see at Christmas time. Very pretty. So we are honoring this holiday--Unicef is doing that and the World Health Orgainization is doing that and I have even met this evening with the CDC and they are doing it as well. Because the humanitarian groups have not been able to be in here for twenty some years there is a great deal cross team collaboration and assistance and support for one another. An example of that is the desires from Unicef to have us assist them with vaccinations. Unicef in light of the holiday and in light of TNI’s request has postponed their vaccination program until this Saturday. We were supposed to be doing vaccinations for Unicef for tomorrow but that is not going happen Our biggest challenge is translators --they burn out very quickly. It is very stressful them and we simply do not have enough translators. I asked him if they were having bad weather? I am standing here watching the clouds roll by. There has been lightening at night but no rain. One of the things that may affect our transport home because we are going to have fly by helicopter out of here is the weather. The Singapore Military has been providing all of our air support. They have a lot of stuff scheduled so when we have bad weather is messes everything up. Any stories? Because we are such large Anglo-Saxons and the people are so small we are seen as a curiosity and we are viewed as large zoo animals. I had an interesting experience …when I walked in a store to buy materials for the clinic, it was a good two minutes before I was able to talk to the store clerk about what I wanted to buy because he did nothing but laugh hysterically at how large I was in contrast to the very small size of his store. ( Blair is 6’5”) So we are all great novelties here…we are walking around--feeling like zoo animals…and the kids….we, are having a lot of fun with the kids because they see us as a novelty and they are curious. They need our help and because we appear so different from them we can put a big smile on their faces. That’s wonderful Everyone is eating MREs trying to make sure that we are self reliant as possible. But, after about two days of eating MREs, I expect that they team will probably start wanting to look for something else…we have found that we have other food available if we want to cook it. It has just been easier to do the MREs. Finally, I can not stress enough that it Hot—Hot—Hot—Hot—here, it is hotter than anyone has ever experienced before. You guys are not getting dehydrated are you? No we are not getting dehydrated, we are being very careful with that. When we need more water it easy to get into town and purchase more. We have had to treat multiple patients with IV solutions due to dehydration. But our team is fine. Are most of your patient’s children? Most of our patients are children. Another interesting piece of information that has been provided to us is that there is a Norwegian Church Aid group (NCA) that is onsite trying to set up water purification system. We are working with all the other NGO and they have been discussing this with Unicef and Unicef is concerned with actually doing too much water purification for this area…. which could actually be of harm to the area--because the people here know that the water is bad and has been bad for many hundreds of years and they boil their when they cook things and they are drinking tea where the water is boiled. Unicef is worried about them bringing in desalination equipment getting a portion of the country use to drinking water that does not require pretreatment and that may create greater problems at a later date The NCA is installing a reverse osmosis machine here. One much larger than the camp really needs and that will be interesting to see how that works out. I think it will be a great benefit here because mostly there are children here and their water needs are very different. Any patients that you have seen and treated--do you feel that because of this medical care your team has saved their lives? Yes, we are providing them with antibiotics and if we were not giving them the antibiotics their survival ability would be in jeopardy. Many, many of our patients are being given life saving treatment even if that treatment is as simple as antibiotics. That is good. Absolutely wonderful The most touching thing that has happened to us is all of the children here that we are treating…for those of us who have children it really…really can be gut wrenching at times. Have you seen any tetanus there? No, we have heard a lot of talk about that –originally there was an awful lot of unfounded information or information that never turns out to be what you expected. Tetanus is one of those. The people that were in these areas that were affected were either killed or have been relocated to refugee camps. In refugee camps you don’t have tetanus because there is nothing to get tetanus from. The other portion of the population is dead. There are however people going through rubble and they are susceptible to tetanus but statistically speaking it is not significant. This is all part of how we are working with the other NGO groups…I had dinner this evening with a man with the World Health Organization and the Center for Disease Control. They are studying all of the issues and the things that they are most concerned about right now is measles which Unicef--with our support, is trying to get 50,000 children over the course of the next couple of days…the next concern is cholera at this time there is not an out break of cholera but they are watching it very closely. The third concern was tetanus and that does not appear to be a problem right now. Have you had any more cases of tuberculosis? Yes but tuberculosis was in the country prior to the tsunami and when we identify them we are isolating them and they are started on the proper medications. But tuberculosis here is not a result of the tsunami. We are not expecting any problem leaving. We plan to use the Singapore military to transport us back to Medan…but we do have contingency plans. The US marines have stated that they could fly us out. We have also talked to the US consulate and they have promised us transportation for all members of our team no matter if they Canadians or from New Zealand. Our Canadian team members have talked to their government officials (I think he said with Canadian Parliament but the transmission had a lot of static so forgive me if I got that wrong)and the Canadian officials have said that they will also provide transportation for all team members regardless of nationality….so, we have a lot of back up plans if the Singapore air force has problems with their schedules….We naturally want to fly with the Singapore military unless we have to make other plans. So I feel very confident that we will not have any problems when we deploy out of here to Medan. Again I want to stress that we are safe. What is the time there? It is January the 20th at 10:30 in the evening. Ok that is all for now, Very good…everyone misses all of you guys…we are proud of you all and take care of each other Will do End of phone conversation Thursday January 20 2005 10:05 pm 10:05 PM EST Approx. 10:05AM January 21st, 2005 local time Good day Blair How are you? We are great! First of all the entire team is assembled back (in town). We thought were going to be slowed down as you may recall when we last spoke because of the holiday, but due to the resourcefulness of the team we were able to get the TNI to take us in two trucks back to (town). We are now waiting (here) for a helicopter –however, we do not expect to fly until 2:00 pm this afternoon. Again, they have asked the helicopters not to fly until after 12:00 pm to honor the holiday. Having just been said that—interestingly enough, I just watched a helicopter land next to five water buffalos. Apparently the buffalos are not bothered by it-- so we are seeing some helicopters fly. We just don’t know if we are going to fly soon or not. So you are finished with your mission? We are all finished. The team is in good spirits. The team is very dirty and very smelly. We are very happy because we have accomplished a lot. I am hoping that the next time I talk to you, I will be able to tell you we are in Medan and from that point we feel like our logistics will be very easy. I will have answers to all that we did today tomorrow when we next talk and hopefully we will be in Medan. I hope so too. Remind everyone when everyone gets into Medan, to call home and check with their families. I will do that. When we get into Medan, we will confirm our travel arrangements with Malaysian Air and I will pass what you said on to the team. OK and I will talk to you tomorrow then? You will talk to me tomorrow morning. OK, Come home safe. Will do. Friday January 21 2005 8:30am A diplomatic mission bumped 12 members of the team, so they are still in (the same town). Four are in (major city). They are back at the hotel. All the rest of the members of the team are still here with me. There are limited flights today, because of the holiday. We are hoping to travel 1st thing tomorrow morning to (major city) and hook up with the balance of the team and join up with the four that left today. We are here at the base--We are actually sleeping with the United States Marines Corp—so we have hooked up with them—some of the guys went into town to get something to eat. Some team members stayed back and ate MREs with the Marines. All of the team members in both locations are fine. Everything is good—we have a place to sleep—we’ve got shelter—we’ve got water—we’ve got food and we’ve got hopes to travel, first thing tomorrow morning. What time is it there 8:24 at night? That ‘s correct. You know we go from flight to flight to flight and we can’t really make any more plans than that, but we always have back up plans. No need to worry. That’s really all that I have to report at this time. You all get some rest tonight. Are you going to call me tonight? That’s correct--I will call. If you don’t get a call from me tonight at 10pm it may mean that we are airborne and if that is the case—I will call you just to let you know that we have all gotten to (the next city). So if I wake you up in the middle of the night I will only be waking you up for a few brief minutes. That’s fine don’t worry about waking me up. I will be standing by OK You take care and tell the Group that everybody is wishing them safe passage and hurry home. Will do End of phone call. Friday January 21 2005 11:24pm I have good news--6 additional members have joined the other four members of the team in Medan. The Balance of the team is scheduled to travel by helicopter via the Singapore Military at 3:00 or 4:00pm today (local) time, which is, 3:00am or 4:00am EST here. The reason for this delay is due to the fact that there are limited helicopters and they can only transport so many people at a time. The balance of the team will stand by the airport until they leave this afternoon. They have about three or possibly four hours wait time in (next city). I think the flight time is about 1 to 1 1/2 hours. I know this is frustrating for you all waiting at home, but remember, they are getting rides with the Singapore Military and they have to travel when the military can transport. There is no need to worry, as everyone is safe. I want to assure all of you, that the entire team will be together very soon. I hope to have more information for you this morning. I may not get an update until 10:00am EST so please be patient. As soon as I know anything I will forward the information on to all of you. Saturday January 22 2005 6:00am I am so happy to report that the balance of the team arrived around 5:00 am, (local) time. They traveled via helicopter to (the larger city). We are all going to get cleaned up and have dinner as a team tonight; we have a little down time tomorrow before heading out to Malaysia. From there I can not give you individual travel plans depending on the east coast team and the west coast team as they have different travel plans. So this evening, I am going to ask the family members to communicate back to their families before they depart tomorrow to let them know what their travel agendas are. We are done. We did a very short exit briefing from our point person on the ground here in Indonesia, and he was extremely appreciative of our work and that’s about all I have to report. Well, I am really happy that everyone is safe and back together…. I am just extremely, extremely happy…. Please tell the team that mother hen (that’s me) is now happy and will probably sleep for a while. Blair starts laughing. Everybody here is so very proud of all of you. I can not emphasize that enough…you will not believe the e-mails that have come in from all over saying –how proud of you they are and what phenomenal work that you are all doing and that sort of thing. We are sitting here now toasting each other saying mission accomplished because from (here) getting home is a cakewalk compared to what we have been through. I can appreciate that. I feel good about that too. I don’t know when I will talk to you next—I will talk to you during day light hours your time over the course of our travels as I can. Sometime today or tomorrow after we get to Malaysia, I will more than likely cut off communications because at that point the team members will be coming home on their individual travel agendas. Ok, if there is anything that I can do for you guys just let me know. I will keep my cell phone on at all times—and you don’t know what time you will contact me? No I don’t have any of that handy OK… Will you call me tomorrow before you leave? I anticipate that I will, yes. OK! Good. Well, like I said, mother hen is very happy now…I am so glad that everyone is safe and together--give everyone my best regards and it is certainly is a very good morning for me as I know it will be for the all of your family and friends…. OK, good--talk with you later. OK. Take care End of phone call… Sunday January 23 From: Brian Mission accomplished. The team is back in touch with thier families and taking separate travel arrangements to get back home in the next few days. Photos have been posted on the Paramedics For Children Web site. |