Groups Prepare Aid as Chile Assesses Need

Chilean President Michelle Bachelet said Sunday her staff was reviewing offers of assistance that would address urgent needs such as field hospitals, mobile bridges, water-purification equipment and rescue workers. With search-and-rescue missions fully under way, the death toll rose to more than 700 from 147 Saturday afternoon, and was expected to rise further.

All the major international aid groups were prepared Sunday to dispatch workers and supplies while maintaining their commitments to the massive relief effort continuing in Haiti, which was devastated in January by a 7.0 magnitude earthquake that killed more than 220,000 people.

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People observed a highway destroyed in an earthquake in Santiago, Chile, on Saturday.
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Chile is assessing the damage from one of world's largest earthquakes in a century. Video courtesy of Reuters.
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"It is not necessarily unusual for a country like Chile to not ask for international assistance," said Kate Conradt, spokeswoman for Save the Children, a Connecticut-based nonprofit that operates in more than 100 countries. "The United States did not call for outside help after Hurricane Katrina, nor did China after the major quake hit Szechuan. In the case of this earthquake, it happened in a more remote area, affected half the number of people that the Haiti quake affected and occurred where the population was less concentrated."

Aiding Chile could extend organizations already pouring enormous resources into Haiti.

"It stretches us, but we can handle it," said United National Children's Fund spokesman Patrick McCormick. "We would never say to Chile if they contacted us, 'Sorry, we're too busy in Haiti and can't help.' We would definitely respond somehow." For Unicef, Haiti is its biggest single emergency in a few years, requiring nearly 200 people there providing food, medicine, shelter and water, but it says it stands ready to aid Chile.

Save the Children has nearly 1,000 workers in Haiti, running mobile medical clinics, providing shelter and food, reuniting families and helping to restore potable water and sanitation. "We do have the capacity, but, yes, it does complicate it that we have a major response going on in Haiti," Ms. Conradt said.

While awaiting word from the Chilean government, groups like Doctors Without Borders and Save the Children have sent in disaster-response specialists to assess the extent of the damage.

Most groups said they are accustomed to responding to multiple disasters at once, particularly in the past couple of years: a cyclone in Myanmar and an earthquake in western China in May 2008; Typhoon Morakot in southeast Asia, a tsunami in American Samoa and an earthquake in Indonesia between last August and September.

The world-wide network of Red Cross agencies was among the responders to each of those disasters. Red Cross officials say they are prepared for simultaneously occurring incidents in part because of well-fortified storage facilities strategically located in Panama, Dubai and Malaysia that allow swift deliveries of supplies and equipment to disparate regions.

In Chile, Red Cross authorities are in the process of assessing the needs in and around Concepción, a spokesman said. The American Red Cross has made $50,000 available to the Chilean Red Cross, and other Red Cross groups in other countries have pledged $300,000.

Tracy Reines, director of the American Red Cross's international-response operations center, said Chilean Red Cross workers accompanied government officials Sunday in assessing the damage from the air. "It still is early days. You saw the increase in the official toll. I don't think anyone is saying they are out of the woods," Ms. Reines said.

Just as for Haiti, efforts are under way to solicit donations for Chile. The Mobile Giving Foundation has set up a service to collect $5 or $10 donations via phone text messages. Donors can earmark their pledges to Habitat for Humanity, World Vision or the Salvation Army.

President Barack Obama said Saturday he had talked with Chile's President Bachelet and pledged U.S. help in rescue and recovery efforts, if asked.

Source:wsj.com