Heavy earthquake hits Haiti

Haiti was hit by a magnitude 7.2 earthquake on 14th August, from which at least 2,207 people lost their lives. It was the deadliest natural catastrophe that happened in 2021.

"The buildings have fallen like card houses."

“Even here in Port-au-Prince, you could feel it. It was strong,” said Winnie Hugot Gabriel, a 32-year-old journalist with a morning radio show.

The earthquake occurred at 8:29 local time and injured over 12,000 people seriously. Hurricane Grace furthered the catastrophe.

Photo: USAID’s Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance

About 135,000 buildings were destroyed or heavily damaged; the government even warned of a tsunami; UNICEF estimated that about half a million children have been affected or displaced by it and warned about a possible large humanitarian crisis. Thousands have become homeless or unemployed, many people have lost everything.

“I’m heartbroken. It is awful. It is my nightmare and the nightmare of anyone who remembers 2010, that something like this would happen again,” said Jonathan M. Katz, an American journalist, in an interview, who was in Haiti during the tragedy. He even wrote a book about bad international response.

Many countries send experts or paid aid, like the USA. Biden promised before the catastrophe occurred that he would help the country quickly. The USA paid 32 million dollars to Haiti. Other nations on the American continent have sent experts or doctors.

The earthquake has hit a country which has lived through many crises before. Of course, the current global pandemic, but other things like corruption, a fragile security situation and political instability due to the murder of their president, Jovenel Moïse, six weeks before the disaster.

After the main earthquake, there were at least 900 aftershocks recorded, the strongest one was a 5.8 earthquake, that’s just 0.1 points below the strongest earthquake in Germany, but it was only the aftershock.

Many volunteers helped, but recovery is still going slowly. The people there have no electricity and water, many wait to get treated by paramedics, and there are just too many injured.

Les Cayes, the third-largest city in Haiti, was closest to the epicenter, so in that town the damages are immense. 76,000 buildings were destroyed or damaged in that town alone; among the buildings are many schools (about 308) or important institutions like medical facilities (53).

“The buildings have fallen like card houses,” said Jonathan Katz.

“There are many people injured. The hospitals are overwhelmed. Some are treating people on the floor; some are just sending people back home,” said Akim Kikonda, an aid worker from the group Catholic Relief Services.

This earthquake happened near the point where the large earthquake occurred in 2010, where 200,000 people perished. It was in the Enriquillo-Plantain-Garden-fault zone.

“The promise was always that the international community was not only going to help rescue people from the rubble. It was a larger promise that, as Bill Clinton famously said, they would help Haiti build back better.

“All you have to do is look at what has happened in the 24 hours since this earthquake hit to see that that never happened. Very little was built back, and that which was built back does not appear to be better,” Katz said.