Haiti

Recently, there has been an earthquake in Haiti (Alleged to be the worst disaster to happen on the Western hemisphere of the world), and I need to put this in some perspective. First of all, I will explain the statistics of the earthquake; which occurred on Tuesday January 12th, 2010. Then I’ll talk about how hard it is for them to receive help.

From what I’ve heard, approximately three million people have been affected by the earthquake, and 200,000 of those people actually died. A reason those numbers might be so high, is because the earthquake was a horrible magnitude of 7 on the Richter scale. Also the numbers might be high because the earthquake occurred at the capital which is Port-Au-Prince (the most populated area of Haiti). Amazingly, after the earthquake, there was also an unexpected amount of 33 aftershocks, most of them having the magnitude of 5 to 5.9.

People weren’t the only things that were affected. Most major landmarks were either damaged, or even destroyed, including: Presidential Palace (President René Préval survived), the national assembly building, the Port-Au-Prince cathedral, the main jail, and most hospitals! The main problem with these building’s being destroyed, is that we can’t get them back. We might be able to rebuild some of the buildings, but they will never have the history they used to. They won’t be amazing antiques anymore.

To have a real idea of what Haitians are going through, we have to imagine ourselves in their shoes. Not only did they experience a horrible earthquake, but they were one of the poorest countries in the world to begin with. The big problem with that is that they don’t have the materials or equipment to help them “heal”. Because of this, other countries are sending troupes over to help, but what ends up happening is that there is no easy access to the Haitians, and the volunteers don’t have the system to deliver necessities such as food and medicine. The reason why this is happening is because other countries aren’t allowed to go through the airport to deliver the help. You might be thinking “why can’t they just land outside of the airport?” Well, the reason why is because Haiti is such a small place, that there is no space for them to land.

To conclude, the way we can help is by delivering food and medicine, and by rebuilding their landmarks, even though they will never be the same. We need to help Haitians to rise above all of this misery and poverty. We need to help the children who are going to be the next generation of Haitians. We can’t fix the past, but we can make the future.


(Sorry, still can't make indents)