My Experience in the Haitian Earthquake James Tamplin, I'06
Thank you for all your thoughts and prayers, the past couple days have been a blur. It seems like Tuesday afternoon was 5 minutes ago. I’m writing this from a studio apartment of a good friend, Alli Goff, in New York City, which is the biggest juxtaposition that you can possibly imagine to Port-au-Prince. The emotions associated with that disparity hasn’t hit home yet. In fact, the entire situation hasn’t hit home yet. I still feel normal. I feel like I did at the beginning of the week. When recanting the events face-to-face I have zero emotion while the person I’m talking to usually ends up crying. I’m sure it has to be shock. I’m not so eagerly awaiting all the emotions, but know they are necessary and healthy.
DISCLAIMER: This is graphic, just a warning. If you feel like passing this on to friends/media feel free. People should know how horrible it is in Haiti.
There were 7 of us that travelled to Haiti. We were doing electrical work, painting, health surveys and roofing repairs in a small rural community called Jeanette on the southern peninsula. Two of us, Drew Eschweiler and I, had been before and the five others, including my current roommate/business partner, Andrew Lee, had not.
The 7 of us returned to Port-au-Prince on Monday and took a tour of the city. The others were due to fly out the next day; they got away safely around 1pm. Andrew and I stayed on one-extra day because we wanted to get a little more flavour and insight into the city. Tuesday morning we walked into downtown, hung out at football pitch, the presidential palace and parliament. The rivers of trash were disgusting, but paled in comparison with what was to come.
Our hotel had two 2-story buildings just a few feet apart. The first contained the kitchen, manager’s office and dining hall on the ground floor and rooms on the second floor. The second building was just rooms. I was staying in the second building.
I walked onto the roof of my building to read a book after I woke up from a nap. The sunset was gorgeous so I went to find Andrew so he could see it. I found him sitting in a rocking chair just outside the dining room in the first building. We headed up to watch the sunset and were joined by three Canadian doctors. Roughly 10 minutes later, around 5:30, the earthquake hit.
The entire building started shaking violently and the Canadian doctors fell to the floor. The first thing I thought was ‘Haiti doesn’t get earthquakes’ – a fraction of a second later I decided that was irrelevant and I didn’t want to be on the building anymore. I sprinted down a short flight of stairs, jumped a railing and dove for a palm tree. Sometime during that sprint there was a sickening crunch as the first building (dining hall, reception etc) pancaked to the ground. Haitian buildings are typically large slabs of concrete supported by cinder-block walls. When the cinder blocks were shaken so they could no longer support the weight of the concrete, the heavy concrete roofs / floors simply came crashing down.
The whole thing lasted somewhere between 5 and 8 seconds. Once earth stopped shaking and I shimmied down the palm tree and checked if Andrew was ok. Next, I sprinted around the collapsed building yelling for anyone who was inside. All that came back was silence. The two-story building was now between 2 and 7 feet tall in various places. Half an hour later I would have been eating dinner inside. A few hours later we determined there were certainly 4 people inside, maybe more.
The streets in the area are lined with tall walls (8 or 9 feet) with razor wire on top. Much of this had toppled and I began pulling the shattered concrete off of people. There were some nasty broken legs and lots of blood. Andrew ran by me asking for the Canadian doctors, he had found a little girl who needed them although he said ‘I’m 90% sure she’s dead’ -- this was the last I saw of him for the next 5 hours. While I stayed within few block radius of the hotel just pulling rocks off of people he had the quick thinking of stopping cars and using their jacks to go into houses and try to pry people out. He returned to the hotel parking lot around 10:30pm.
In the few hours following the quake women were crying and dancing in the streets, people were on their knees praying, yet even those displaying immense emotion had an inner quiet to them. I could see that perhaps some of them didn’t understand what an earthquake was and others just couldn’t believe that this had happened -- neither could I. A choir group started singing just behind the hotel, each time an aftershock hit the harmonious hymns would be punctuated by screams of terror.
I felt nothing immediately after the quake and I still don’t feel anything. The group of foreigners and Haitians in the parking lot banded together well. The Canadian doctors, who had lost their fourth member in the other hotel building, were admirably calm and composed and sorted through their medical supplies helping people when they could.
Once Andrew returned, we hugged, I gave him water and we started walking towards where he had been. The staging areas on the side of the road, marked by large boulders to prevent cars driving into them were now empty. I don’t know who cleared the dead and injured but they were mostly gone in the vicinity of the hotel. After walking for 10 minutes past huddled groups of praying and singing Haitians another aftershock hit, with it came screams but also the crackling of glass and concrete as another 3 story house collapsed 40 feet from where we were standing. We decided that the best we could do was to resume in the morning when we could see what we were doing.
I didn’t sleep much that night. One of the Haitians in the parking lot had a portable radio. I lay there listening to it, picking out roughly half of the French broadcast. I heard that the palace had collapsed and the true enormity of the disaster dawned on me. If the most impressive building in the country had collapsed them innumerable shacks, mud huts, and self-made cinder blocks didn’t stand much of a chance.
Wednesday…..
As soon as sunlight began to stretch across the sky Andrew and I left. We came upon a house with a man standing on the roof with a hammer. He was a friend of the family who lived there. Their two-year-old child was trapped inside and we could hear him crying, he was clearly breathing so we set about trying to get him out. First we had to determine where he was, which was immensely difficulty given the fact that every wall and room inside the house had been shifted. There was hardly any airspace and the sound was so muffled it was impossible to determine a direction. We ended up cutting a hole in the roof by pounding the roof with a hammer and a sledgehammer then pulling the fractured concrete away by hand before it had a chance to fall down (potentially on top of him) We opened up a hole but it turned out to be in the wrong place, so it took more critical time to whack away with the sledgehammer to expand it to the right area. As soon as it was open we started pulling out children’s toys and bathroom tile.
By this time the kid, Sebastian, wasn’t responding to our calls. An elderly man standing nearby started crying, calling out for Jesus’ help and having a serious breakdown. It was more distracting than disconcerting, so the family friend ordered him off the roof.
We were blocked by a huge chunk of wall that hadn’t splintered so we had to break it up and pull it out using a couple of steel poles as levers and a thick belt. As soon as we got it out everyone clambered down off the roof and I went head first inside the house, I pulled out more cinderblocks and bathroom tiles but didn’t see Sebastian. I was stomach-down over a large piece of concrete pulling things out from ahead of me. It turns out he was trapped directly beneath the concrete slab I was lying on. All I saw at first was his head and arm sticking out, both intact. I was elated. That elation quickly vanished. His wrist had no pulse. His neck was hot, but again, no pulse. I managed to fully get down inside the hole I had dug out and loosen the rocks on either side of him and pull. This didn’t work either; his legs were seriously crushed. There was no way I could get to his mouth or chest to give CPR. Andrew and the family friend both climbed down and checked his pulse and confirmed he was dead.
Of all the things I saw this got to me the most, though I still don’t feel much emotion. Sebastian had a full life in front of him. He was alive when we arrived and dead two hours later when we reached him. We just weren’t fast enough.
Andrew and I didn’t see any other people trapped on the way to the hotel so we headed to the embassy. The taxi charged us $30. We were ushered into a large compound with manicured lawns, running water, electricity and air conditioning. We filled out forms, drank DeSalini bottled water, and sat on bright orange plastic chairs watching ‘Horror in Haiti’ on CNN. After an hour we decided that it was bullshit that people were dying on the streets and we were sitting in luxury. The embassy head discouraged us from leaving but told us he couldn’t stop us.
Filling up as many empty DeSalini water bottled we could, getting many from trash cans (some in the trash were half full) and topping them up at the Culligan water cooler we walked into the village next to the embassy. We greeted people with ‘Ca Va?’ The rough equivalent of ‘How’s it going’ to with we’d get and ‘Ca Va’ / ‘It’s going’ or a ‘Ca n’va pas’ / ‘It’s not going’. If they said there was a problem we asked if there were people trapped inside their house. Most people were simply out of food and water. We didn’t find anyone trapped. The sun was almost at its midday peak; for anyone trapped I worried they were in a giant oven.
After we picked up some crackers on the side of the road we got a lift downtown with a man who had lost his wife. His two daughters were in the front seat and he was driving around looking for her. We stopped in the UN but they just turned him away.
After being dropped off we made our way to a doctors without borders clinic. Turning onto the clinic’s block there were injured just lying on the street stretching for at least a few hundred yards. There must have been several hundred people there. A Haitian med student saw us and asked for help. We spent the next several hours following him around, he would diagnose and we would administer treatment. This mainly involved cleaning, sanitizing and dressing wounds, splinting broken bones, and giving them painkillers.
There were some nasty wounds: some inches deep, some sheets of skin ripped off large chunks of limbs, in a few cases we had to wipe off a greenish white reside, which I presume was mould. None of this phased me, we were able bodied and had to do what was necessary. The frustrating and saddening part was the constant stream of people tugging on my shirt saying ‘Doctor, Doctor! Look at my wife/sister/brother/husband.’
I’m not a doctor, I have just as much medical knowledge as any other normal person, but Andrew and I stood out because we were the only two white people on the street.
Telling someone that their son, who had been mangled inside a falling building and who is in immense pain that 1) I’m not a doctor and 2) they’ll have to wait in line behind 5 people who are also in danger of losing limbs is not easy.
It made it all the more difficult that my arms were cut up badly from digging through rubble and I had to be careful when handling their blood.
There were some people we simply couldn’t do much for. One man was lying on his back with his legs splayed outwards, almost like a frog’s, but because of a horrible compound fracture in his right shin, both feet were facing the same direction. Another woman was on a stretcher and was carried to us wherever we went. Her face looked gaunt and her eyes had a glassy glazed over look. Glancing at her injuries she should have been shrieking, although the only thing coming out of her mouth the occasional muffled groan.
As the sun began to set we just left 40 or some people on the street because we ran out of supplies. We had used up all the gauze, bandages, iodine, painkillers and saline solution. We literally had nothing to treat these people with. We went to find more at the local hospital, walking away while people called out ‘Doctor!’ after us.
On the way to the hospital we stopped by the med student’s relative’s house. The building had been leveled. His relatives said there were 5 people inside. There was nothing we could do so we moved onto the hospital.
The hospital was easily the most depressing and nauseating building I’ve ever been in my entire life. I felt sick the moment I walked through the main gate, not just from a physical aspect, but from being utterly disgusted with the lack of care these people were getting. Literally lack of care. There wasn’t a doctor in sight. The med student we were with said they’d all left. Bodies were strewn from the parking lot all the way inside. Generally the people still alive were in the parking lot, as they’d be brought there most recently. Inside was a mortuary not a hospital. Dead bodies were strewn against the walls like firewood. The combination of smeared dirt on the ground and the greenish walls gave the building the air of a trying-to-be-trendy, grimy urban nightclub, not a modern hospital.
After 5 minutes I couldn’t take it anymore. There was clearly nothing we could do and there were clearly no supplies. The med student checked the pulse of an infant, told his family who was standing over him that he was dead and then we left. I walked of there with my head down trying not to make eye contact with the people who probably wouldn’t make it through the night.
We took a motorcycle taxi back to the embassy. Thanks to the negotiating skill of the med student it was only $5 this time, down from his $120 initial price. The extortion taking place in the crisis was equally as disheartening as the scenes of destruction. We chatted to some of the search and rescue team (US AID) and gave them some info as to where we were and what we’d seen. We tried to sleep and eventually passed out watching CNN. I was awoken once to an aftershock and everyone ran screaming from the embassy. I crashed out on the grass for an hour or so.
Thursday…
We had the option to fly out that morning at 9am, but volunteered to stay for the next flight, so we ended up in the rear of the embassy helping US citizens who were injured and getting med-evaced to Guantanamo Bay. We helped set up a tent next to the helipad (and by helipad I mean open field next to the embassy) administered IVs and adjusted thermal blankets. By this time the military had begun to show up, there were some army folks who helped us moved the injured into hummers to be taken to the evac site. I was impressed by their professionalism and how they worked as a team. The contrast between the efficiency of the troops and the Haitian police / citizen was night and day.
Unfortunately the only people we saw that day were troops and search-and-rescue teams, no medical supplies or medics for the Haitians. An army doctor I spoke to was annoyed that his orders were to only assist US citizens and Military personnel. He wanted to help the people dying in the streets.
In the afternoon we took some medical supplies to a children’s hospital that was about a 20 minute walk from the embassy. I shuttled back and forth several times between the embassy and the hospital, many times getting rides in the back of pickup trucks that were driving around. I asked almost everyone if their families were ‘vivant?’ (alive?). Answers were split between ‘yes, they’re fine’ and ‘we don’t know where someone is’. I tried to give them water bottles when I could and some occasional snacks that came in the MRE’s (Meals Ready to Eat) that were for the hospital patients.
At the hospital we helped rig up a tarp from the second storey covering the road outside. No patients could be inside the building for obvious reasons and having them outside under the scorching sun must have felt like torture. I had to head back to the embassy after a few hours. I hadn’t eaten or really slept since Tuesday lunch. By this time the embassy staff were getting to know us and simply let us through without blinking. What surprised me was the fact that the Haitian security guards had stuck around to protect the US embassy. If I were working security at the Haitian embassy in London or DC I’d be helping my fellow countrymen, not protecting some foreigner’s property.
I wolfed down an MRE and crashed for a while on the manicured lawn. Andrew and I headed back to the hospital where we were told that another hospital had run out of body bags. There were 12 dead, could we go and pick them up? The two of us and two Haitians jumped into a Tap-Tap, which is essentially a converted pickup truck that has an extended bed with seats and a roof over it.
Putting on gloves and a mask we arrived around sunset. A heavyset American man who spoke fluent French and was from Intelligence Branch directed us to the corpses. They had been placed across the road from the hospital; most had begun to decay in the blistering heat. We laid body bags next to each corpse and opened them up, and then one-by-one lifted them in. When you grip a loved one’s hand, arm or leg there is warmth and a give to the skin. These limbs were swollen, cold and hard. It took some force to bend joints into the right position so they’d fit inside the bag.
The heavy corpses were difficult, one was a police officer, and took three or four of us to lift. It was saddening when you could lift the body bag by yourself.
About three quarters of the way through my eyes began to burn. Like when you’re cutting an onion, but twice as worse and without any tears, just an intense stinging sensation. I was still emotionally fine but couldn’t see so I had to step away and get some air. The way Andrew reasoned it out was that it was better that we do this. We had the ability to leave and had no ties to this place. Better us than them.
We never ID’d the bodies. We were told it wasn’t necessary by the head of the hospital. Supposedly a journalist had taken pictures a few hours before. 45 minutes later we arrived at the cemetery but it was locked. Four of us would count ‘Un-Deux-Trois’ (‘One-Two-Three’) and toss the bodies about 8 feet into the front-scoop of a nearby bulldozer. I have no idea where it would take them.
Returning to the embassy around 10pm we were allowed to use the showers outside the crystal blue swimming pool. A short time later an embassy staff member told us there was a cargo plane leaving. Given the utter lack of food, water and medical attention we came to the conclusion that things were going to get ugly fast. Up to that point the masses were docile. There was no rioting, looting or violence, however, starving people are less inclined to act in a civilized manner. We might not be able to help that way we had been without fearing violence. On top of this aid was beginning to pour in faster. Military choppers and aid planes had begun to dot the sky.
Friday...
We took a convoy of black Chevy Suburban’s to the airport just like out of a movie. Seeing the scenes of destruction whizz by one last time from the air conditioned comfort only served to drive home the point that there is a huge disparity in this world. Just because I had a couple of little books, one that says ‘United States’ and one that says ‘United Kingdom’ means that I got to leave this hell and receive the best medical attention available if needed.
We arrived Friday morning. Andrew’s brother picked us up from McGuire Air Force Base in New Jersey and we had lunch in Brooklyn. Just another Friday afternoon. I called family and friends, all of whom were relieved and sent lots of love. I spent Friday night out in the East Village having a quiet drink with half a dozen friends who live in NY. For the first time I felt overwhelming emotion – happiness.
I’ll make my way back to San Fran sometime in the next few days. I’m in no hurry to get back to the work. I just want to absorb as much love from friends and family as possible.
If you have a minute please donate to the Haitians. They need it more than us in the developed world ever will. If you’re in the US you can text ‘Haiti’ to 90999. It will donate $10 to the Red Cross.
Here’s a small anecdote to leave you with. My mother had a dream over the summer that I would be in an earthquake. She is a very spiritual woman and gave me a cut-crystal on a silver necklace, telling me that it would protect me from earthquakes. As I live on the San Andreas fault that seemed like a good idea. I had it with me in Haiti and am never taking it off again.
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