Tech Community SitRep (1/16/2010)

Courtesy of the good folks at InSTEDD, here is a comprehensive situation report on the tech communities activities through 1/16/2010.

Download it as a Word Document:
Technology Community SitRep Haiti 6 Jan 2010

View it online below:

Technology Community Sit Rep: 16 Jan, 2009 as of 2359 hours
Prepared by Luke Beckman, National Response Liaison, InSTEDD, +1-650-740-5853, Beckman@instedd.org
*** If info not on SitRep, it may be on prev. ones since I want to include the newest, most current efforts without making the SitRep too long, or I don’t know about the info***
Coordination is key. We must continue to work together and do a better job of it every day.

Great Aggregators

http://inventory.ict4peace.org/Haiti+Earthquake+-+January+2010

http://haiti.sahanafoundation.org/orgs

o Sahana looking for translation support http://translate.hfoss.eu/wiki/Translation

Ushahidi
o http://haiti.ushahidi.com/
o Real time situation room http://sitroom.ushahididev.com/

Open Street Maps (OSM)
o http://haiti.openstreetmap.nl/ Best map of the situation on the ground I know of. Hundreds of volunteers working around the clock doing mapping on the ground.

US SOCOM online civ/mil coordination community

http://community.apan.org/

Best Practices
• SOUTHCOM International Disclosure Office confirms the intent of the Command is to share all unclassified information that will assist the provision of assistance as widely as possible.
• CrisisCamps sprung up around the U.S. and worked around the clock building technology applications for current and future response efforts. Hundreds of people mobilized supporting real needs on the ground.
• http://crisescomm.ning.com/
o Trying to improve the dialogue between disaster affected communities and the agencies that seek to assist them.

Citizen Outreach
• Out of DC Crisis Camp- coordinated by Josh Nesbit, Exec Dir FrontlineSMS:Medic, Brian Herbert of Ushahidi, and Robert Munro a Haitian Shortcode is up and running. Anyone in Haiti can text their location and message to “4636” and hundreds of volunteers will be sorting through and analyzing information to better inform response and recovery efforts of REAL needs on the ground. A media and social outreach campaign is already underway.
o This number currently only works for Digicel. Comcel will be up soon.
• Large media campaign started for http://haiticrisis.appspot.com/ . They are still trying to coordinate with ICRC to sync missing persons data with http://www.familylinks.icrc.org/web/doc/siterfl0.nsf/htmlall/familylinks-haiti-eng?opendocument. No luck yet.

Medical
• WHO/PAHO (medical lead) estimates that the number of dead ranges between 40,000 and 50,000 people. A mass burial of 3,000 bodies was reported yesterday.
• At least eight hospitals and/or health centres have collapsed or sustained serious damage. This includes: the UN clinic at the Christopher Hotel (collapsed); Martissant emergency room/centre [managed by MSF] (damaged and unstable, all patients evacuated); Solidarité maternity hospital [MSF-managed] (severely damaged); Trinité trauma centre [MSF-managed] (severely damaged); HUEH University Hospital (damaged); new hospital on Delmas (damaged); Eliazard Germain hospital in Petionville (damaged); Petits freres et soeurs (damaged).
• At least nine hospitals are functioning: Hospital St. Espirit, Hospital Pere Damien, Clinique Hospital Le Messie, Le Nouveau Ventre Medico Hospitalier, Hospital Sacre Coeur, Hospital Sacre Coeur, Hopital Albert Schweitzer, and the Argentine military hospital.
• Major health concerns include untreated trauma wounds and infection of wounds. Health threats increase due to threats of infectious diseases, diarrhea, lack of safe drinking water and sanitation. Damage to health facilities means that routine treatment will be disrupted for people with pre-existing conditions such as HIV/AIDS, diabetes and cancer.
• Massive U.S. hospital network (1,000) standing by to deliver Haitian doctors, supplies, water- anything that is requested. No way to get supplies in due to ATC load and no ground or air transport once in Haiti. These guys have STRONG local contacts. How do we act on this?
• About 40% of Haitian population is under 14 (CIA World Factbook)- be considering when thinking long term rebuilding and reconstruction
Ground Truth- UN
• Estimate that 200,000 families (up to one million people) are in need of immediate shelter and non-food assistance.
• Fuel for humanitarian operations will only last 2 to 3 more days before operations will be forced to cease. A fuel distribution mechanism is required urgently.
• A joint UNDAC/EU/WFP assessment found 80-90 percent of the buildings destroyed in Leogane and 40-50 percent in Carrefour and Gressier.
• Force Protection must be a priority for supply distribution. MINUSTAH is assuming the responsibility to provide protection for distribution
• The tankering of water began today with 250,000 liters of water being distributed to 52 water distribution points in 17 zones with the assistance of the private sector.
• PaP port will remain closed for some time.
• A dedicated WFP civil/military logistics coordination officer is now operational in Port-au-Prince. Coordination priorities include tasking of assets, assigning flight/convoy slots and clarifying procedures. (Who is that?)

Coordination
• Need to stress importance of civ/mil cooperation. Reports from UN are that they NEED military support, esp overland transit and coordination. Navy reports air assets with few supplies to deliver. Let’s make it happen.

• Current priorities for air movement are medical supplies, then food and water, and then personnel.

Mapping
• ESRI Overview of all GIS http://www.esri.com/services/disaster-response/earthquakes/resources.html
• Early collaboration around all data sources http://geonode.org/
• Google Repository http://www.google.com/relief/haitiearthquake/geoeye.html
• Crisis Commons Wiki http://crisiscommons.org/wiki/index.php?title=Haiti/2010_Earthquake

Communications
• Undersea fiber cable between Bahamas and PaP destroyed
• Main internet basestation for PaP has 48 hours left of fuel.
• Digicel Haiti executives are putting in marathon effort. CEO has personally been seeing to each on the ground need.

For coordination/collaboration questions or issues, please contact Luke Beckman, National Response Liaison, InSTEDD +16507405853, Skype: lukebeckman, Email: Beckman@instedd.org.
Coordination also is ongoing in conjunction with STAR-TIDES (linwells@gmail.com,+1202 436-6354)