This is an update from one of our volunteers in Nepal:
“Yesterday, we convinced two local boys with a massive truck to take us around to the local villages with the Canadian Search and Disaster Dog Association.”
“Most of the villages on the main road had been checked and cleared but people were living in camps of 25-50 people, tarps on the ground. They have no food, no money, and no shelter aside from the tarps.”
“We got word from a motorcyclist that one village 90 minutes drive into the mountainside still had someone missing so we headed that way.”
The volunteer describes nearly careening off the sides of cliffs several times until they reached the village of Benjil where they helped the Canadian Search and Disaster Dog Association search for a missing child.
“We did our best to recover the body and dig through the rubble of what was once a house, but to no avail. The dogs had a scent, but we came up empty handed.”
Twenty-four hours after the earthquake, the villagers pulled a 5-year-old boy out of the rubble. He was doing well, but his foot, crushed when the building caved in on him, was still badly inflamed.
“We were able to convince the family to allow us to take them to the UN hospital in Kathmandu. It looks like his foot will be saved.”
The volunteer describes the conditions of this village of 2,000.
“Of the 200 homes, only 10 remain standing. They have no power and all of their food stores were destroyed. To charge their cell phones, they have to walk 6 km (2-3 hours) down a steep cliff. We passed out over 100 meal packs to the village, and left a small generator in the community center at the top of the mountain along with mats and whatever we had on us."
“We will be traveling with our young Nepalese companions in the truck, loading it up every day at 6am, and heading out to another village within a four-hour radius of Kathmandu. The goal is to deliver at least one generator, 50 tents, and several hundred food packs per day."
“Specials thanks to our comrades down here, Los Topos, who found a body in a mudslide yesterday; the Canadian search team for being by our side and teaching us how to cook an MRE in the back of a truck; the Church of Scientology Volunteer Ministers for providing food, shelter, and local logistics to get all the supplies packed and in hand daily; and to everyone that donated.”
M.S.
