News from the Field

As a tsunami, earthquakes and typhoons battered huge swathes of the Pacific region, the Japan Disaster Relief (JDR) system has experienced one of the busiest periods in its entire history in responding almost simultaneously to multiple natural disasters.

A Japanese medical team continued to help survivors of two earthquakes which struck the Indonesian island of Sumatra a week ago, but a 64-strong team of rescue workers and three sniffer dogs who spent days combing through the massive wreckage caused by the tremors returned to Japan Wednesday (October 8). The government officially called off search attempts and concentrated on trying to help survivors of the catastrophe which killed hundreds of people, destroying parts of the province capital of Padang and leveling entire villages in surrounding areas.

The Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) was also preparing to send a team to the disaster area to assess its reconstruction needs. JICA has had a major presence in Indonesia for many years, participating in many development projects and also helping in the wake of other, earlier disasters.

JICA, which is part of the JDR system, separately was also dispatching emergency supplies to Samoa which, along with America Samoa and Tonga, was inundated by a tsunami with 15-foot high waves a week ago. The death toll there climbed toward 200.

Elsewhere in the region, the northern part of the Philippines Monday was hit by Typhoon Parma, a week after an earlier typhoon, Ketsana, wreaked havoc in the capital, Manila, and other areas, killing nearly 300 people.

Typhoon Ketsana then smashed into Viet Nam, killing around 100 people, leaving tens of thousands homeless and destroying and damaging thousands of buildings.

Responding to government requests for help, JICA sent emergency assistance to both countries.

In Papua New Guinea, the death toll from an outbreak of infectious diseases such as cholera and dysentery, partly caused by severe bad weather, reached at least 124. Thousands of people were also infected and JICA again responded to government requests by dispatching emergency supplies.

Addressing these multiple emergencies, it has been one of the busiest periods in the history of the Japan Disaster Relief (JDR) system.

JDR is a network of official and civilian Japanese agencies, experts and volunteers which, between them, are able to provide rescue, medical, logistical and other assistance, often within hours of a natural disaster. JICA is an integral part of the system.

Japan, which is itself prone to earthquakes and other disasters, began its global humanitarian role modestly enough with the dispatch of a small medical team to help Cambodian refugees in the late 1970s.

In 1987 this ad hoc help was formalized with the adoption of the Japan Disaster Relief Team Law (JDR Law) officially enshrining the commitment by Japan to assist the victims of catastrophes wherever they occur.

After the 7.6 magnitude earthquake struck some 85 kilometers northwest of the West Sumatra Province capital of Padang September 30, a 64-strong JDR rescue team accompanied by sniffer dogs, flew within hours to the stricken region. It was the first international organization to arrive on the scene.

A second 23-strong team of doctors and nurses also went to the epicenter of the quake and emergency supplies of tents, blankets, sleeping pads, electric generators and water purifiers were rushed to the region.

The rescue team and their dogs combed buildings in Padang where many other victims in addition to the estimated 1,000 dead, had been trapped. However, officials in Padang itself called off the search for survivors Monday as the focus shifted to bringing medical help to survivors in the city and surrounding areas which remained cut off.

The rescue team searched through the rubble of Pariyaman city where a massive landslide swept through the area, entirely ‘swallowing’ at least one village and killing some 200 people before returning to Japan.

The JDR medical team was assisting survivors, even as a semblance of normality began to return to Padang itself with children attending some makeshift schools and businesses tentatively reopening. It was expected to stay another week.

The JICA assessment team was being assembled to visit the stricken region and decide what immediate and more long term assistance the agency could provide as the region began to try to recover.

Elsewhere, JICA has dispatched tents, plastic sheeting, sleeping pads, blankets, water purifiers and plastic tanks from its central warehouse in Singapore to Samoa which is still struggling to recover from the September 29 tsunami. Commemoration services were held throughout Samoa, neighboring American Samoa and Tonga where nearly 200 people were killed as huge waves swept through low lying areas.

In addition to the dead some 32,000 other people - 18% of the country’s population - were displaced and the country faced as enormous task of reconstruction. JICA has been active in Samoa on various development projects for many years.

Even as the Philippines and Viet Nam struggled to recover from the effects of typhoon Ketsana, another destructive force, typhoon Parma battered the northern Philippines this week, killing at least 15 people, toppling power lines, ripping up trees and tearing away the roofs of buildings.

The capital, Manila, was still clearing up in the wake of Ketsana after which JICA had sent blankets, sleeping pads, storage and water tanks and water purifiers to the area.

The agency sent similar supplies to the central Vietnamese city of Danang from its Singapore warehouse.

To combat the outbreak of infectious diseases in Papua New Guinea, infusion packs, rehydration fluids, disinfectant, soaps, bleaches and sprays were sent to that country.