{"id":48232,"date":"2015-05-05T15:08:50","date_gmt":"2015-05-05T07:08:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=48232"},"modified":"2015-05-05T15:17:40","modified_gmt":"2015-05-05T07:17:40","slug":"rebuilding-nepal-canadas-disaster-relief-team-sets-up-operations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2015\/05\/05\/rebuilding-nepal-canadas-disaster-relief-team-sets-up-operations\/","title":{"rendered":"Rebuilding Nepal: Canada&#8217;s disaster relief team sets up operations"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"getty embed image\" style=\"background-color:#fff;display:inline-block;font-family:'Helvetica Neue',Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;color:#a7a7a7;font-size:11px;width:100%;max-width:594px;\">\n<div style=\"overflow:hidden;position:relative;height:0;padding:66.835017% 0 0 0;width:100%;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/\/embed.gettyimages.com\/embed\/472097242?et=4oGPotyaSIZO8aWmaA8xlg&#038;viewMoreLink=off&#038;sig=ApnzSEHeRGHhDJSeUjo8LlPGZCf9WS_kyabQmPBJ3lY=&#038;caption=true\" width=\"594\" height=\"397\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"display:inline-block;position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p style=\"margin:0;\">\n<div style=\"padding:0;margin:0 0 0 10px;text-align:left;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/472097242\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color:#a7a7a7;text-decoration:none;font-weight:normal !important;border:none;display:inline-block;\">View image<\/a> | <a href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color:#a7a7a7;text-decoration:none;font-weight:normal !important;border:none;display:inline-block;\">gettyimages.com<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>OTTAWA &#8212; Canada&#8217;s disaster-relief team is now setting up operations in earnest in Nepal, but aid agencies and the Nepalese government warned Monday that a long road of rebuilding after the devastating earthquake lies ahead.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s far away; it&#8217;s on the other side of the world. It&#8217;s going to be easy for people to forget,&#8221; said David Morley, president of UNICEF Canada.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;People have really stepped up,&#8221; said Michael Messenger, World Vision Canada&#8217;s incoming president, but he added: &#8220;We are still in the early stage&#8230; We are looking for more resources.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The assessment came as Canada&#8217;s Disaster Assistance Response Team took additional steps to ramp up its relief operations in earthquake-ravaged Nepal, where the death toll stands at 7,300.<\/p>\n<p>A third Canadian Forces C-17 transport plane landed in Kathmandu early Monday carrying DART engineering equipment, support vehicles and 18 Canadian Forces personnel, said Maj.-Gen. Charles Lamarre, deputy commander of the Forces joint operations branch.<\/p>\n<p>A fourth C-17 carrying 30 personnel, four all-terrain vehicles, an excavator and supplies was airborne to the Indian capital of New Delhi late Monday afternoon, he added.<\/p>\n<p>After its initial assessments, the DART has decided to set up a camp northeast of Kathmandu in Sindhupalchok region.<\/p>\n<p>The camp will provide medical services to locals, and will co-ordinate a deeper push into Nepal&#8217;s Charikot region, Lamarre said.<\/p>\n<p>Messenger, who just returned from five days in Nepal, said serious logistical challenges must be overcome to reach isolated populations.<\/p>\n<p>The focus of his organization is now on helping survivors find shelter, clean water and tending to traumatized children, he said.<\/p>\n<p>Bad weather, in the form of a pending monsoon season, along with an unforgiving mountainous geography and massive damage is also hindering access, said Messenger.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Aid is getting through, but it&#8217;s going far more slowly than we would like,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;You can&#8217;t fly a helicopter in the mountains, in the fog.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>In addition to the geographic hurdle, there is a growing risk of water-borne disease, said Morley.<\/p>\n<p>People are living out of doors and are either afraid to &#8212; or simply can&#8217;t &#8212; go home, he said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;So monsoons come and you risk living in water and living in filth because where&#8217;s the black water going to go, where&#8217;s the wastewater going to go?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Morley said it is essential to keep public interest from waning because last week&#8217;s quake is the worst since the terrible Haiti tremor of 2010.<\/p>\n<p>Morley said he is happy that half of UNICEF&#8217;s $50-million emergency appeal has been met, but much more will have to be raised in the months ahead.<\/p>\n<p>Despite an international outpouring of support, the Nepalese government warned Monday that there&#8217;s a huge funding gap that needs to be addressed in the interest of its long-term recovery.<\/p>\n<p>Those suffering most right now are children, who are severely traumatized, say Messenger and Morley.<\/p>\n<p>Morley said some schools appear to have withstood the earthquake and are still standing, which bodes well for getting children back to class in a few weeks and working towards re-establishing some sense of normalcy.<\/p>\n<p>Messenger said child-friendly spaces are being established, and he saw some children filter in to talk to counsellors, and try to express themselves using music or art.<\/p>\n<p>But some children are clearly bearing new emotional scars from the last week&#8217;s carnage.<\/p>\n<p>Messenger spoke to one 13-year-old boy who had &#8220;this deep fear and loss in his eyes,&#8221; and told him he dreaded returning to school.<\/p>\n<p>When Messenger asked him why, he replied:<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t want to see which of my classmates are still missing.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>View image | gettyimages.com OTTAWA &#8212; Canada&#8217;s disaster-relief team is now setting up operations in earnest in Nepal, but aid &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":48275,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-48232","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news-ca","mauthors-mike-blanchfield","mauthors-the-canadian-press1"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48232","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48232"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48232\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48275"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48232"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48232"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48232"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}