That’s why an Oxfam America emergency response launched in La Pelota last October sought not only to meet people’s immediate needs, but to help them mitigate the risks of their community for the future.
When it rains hard, La Pelota is one of the first communities in the area to flood, in part because a vigorously growing plant called la ninfa clogs the local waterways. The plant is a sign of another problem people face: poor infrastructure for sanitation. Most families rely on pit latrines whose contaminants feed the growth of la ninfa.
In October, Tropical Depression 12-E hit. It rained for almost two weeks straight. On one side of La Pelota the lake overflowed, and on the other side its natural drain spilled its banks.
“It began to rain quite a lot. Little by little, the lake drained, but then the water level rose as it continued to rain,” said Juan Francisco Flores, a 32-year-old community member. “The lake doesn’t flow fast enough through the channel. The water backs up and that’s what floods the community… The stream was flooding on one side and the lake on the other. We were isolated.”
The response from the community to the flooding was well planned and evacuation was timely, due to preparedness work that had been done by Oxfam partner Fundación Maquilishuat (FUMA), in recent years. However, damage to crops was severe.
Together with FUMA and the World Food Programme, Oxfam America launched a food-for-work initiative that not only helped families in La Pelota survive in the first months after the emergency, but reduced the risk they would face in the future. FUMA and citizens of La Pelota decided to clean out the channel to allow the water to flow more easily and prevent flooding. Oxfam provided material to do the work, FUMA provided monitoring and technical assistance, and the families carried out the work.
The project provided people with 100 pounds of corn, 33 pounds of rice, 20 pounds of beans, and a gallon of cooking oil, in exchange for 80 hours of work a month.
“The food-for-work project has been well received. It was very effective to implement this project at this time of year, when people usually don’t have work,” says Sandra Quinteros of FUMA. “There’s been a selection process for the FFW program, with several criteria—that they lost at least 50 percent of their production; that they live on less than two dollars a day; that they have many children or older adults to care for; that they are day laborers; and that they are willing to work.”
The food-for-work project has been implemented in 99 poor communities like La Pelota, in 15 municipalities throughout El Salvador. A total of 3,800 families earned a three-month supply of corn, beans, rice, and oil for a family of five, enabling them to recover from their losses and now live in better prepared communities.
]]>In the department of Baja Verapaz the situation is critical. Guatemala's so-called dry corridor runs through this department, where a severe drought precipitated a food emergency last September.
"They lost last year's harvest because of the drought" explains Gloria Gonzalez of the Association of Community Health Services (ASECSA), referring to the small-scale farmers in the communities of Cubulco, Rabinal, and Salamá. "This winter started well. They planted new crops and were confident that they would do well. But now they've lost those crops as well. We estimate that six in ten farmers have lost their harvests."
ASECSA, with the support of Oxfam, is helping those affected with free clinics and food supplies, especially in Cubulco, where the population is still cut off. The only way of reaching this community is via a 300-metre hanging bridge which collapsed in the rains. Help is arriving by motorboat, but the population is afraid to go outside because of the risks posed by the Chixoy River, which has swollen considerably.
In the municipality of Champerico in the south-east of the department of Retalhuleu, the situation is also worrying. This coastal area was flooded when the Samala River basin overflowed, destroying harvests, killing livestock, and contaminating water sources. The Community Coordinating Association for Health Services (ACCSS) has been working in this region since the flooding caused by Hurricane Mitch in 1998, and in May, just weeks before the rains began, it completed a project to train 20 water, sanitation, and hygiene-promotion leaders. They soon had an opportunity to put their newly-acquired knowledge into practice.
" The leaders were able to get to work and take immediate action,” says Lisa Donado of the ACCSS. “They performed evacuations, asked us for chlorine and aluminum sulfate to treat water, contacted the Ministry of Health about fumigation, and they dug channels to drain off the floodwater."
However, a great deal of rehabilitation work still needs to be done. ACSS estimates that just in the communities where they are working there are at least 500 contaminated wells and flooded latrines. "We're currently putting together a rehabilitation plan for the 10 worst-affected communities", she adds. "The most urgent tasks are to drain and clean the wells and latrines, repair communal water tanks, and promote hygiene."
In El Salvador, Oxfam has a warehouse holding pre-positioned supplies, which enables a rapid response. Within 24 hours of the declaration of national emergency, Oxfam and its partners were assisting the affected communities, providing water and sanitation, installing water tanks, and distributing buckets, diapers, and mattresses.
Oxfam has raised US$415,000 for the immediate response and rehabilitation work.
]]>“The water rose above the windows. That was around one or two o’clock in the morning. It rose very quickly. I left my house swimming through the window and we went to the house of a neighbor who has a wide wall. We all climbed onto that wall, even some dogs. There we stayed until five or six o’clock, when the rain began to stop. Then, with the light of day, we all helped each other to get out. By then, the bridge had already collapsed and they had to get us to the other side of the river with a rope, one by one. On the other side, a pick-up truck waited for us, ready to bring us here, to the shelter.”
Mayra’s little house of cement blocks remained intact, but she lost all of her belongings. In the mud and rubbish, she found a picture of her two children, 7 and 8 years old. At the sight of it, Mayra burst in tears. The loss of these irreplaceable things is what most hurts.
“We were the last ones in the neighborhood to get out. But not via the streets. We had to go through the houses of other people. We didn’t know what to do! My brother came and we put my mother in a big bucket to get her out. I walked behind them, hanging on to the ropes they provided us with. And when the car went over the bridge, it came down.”
“Eight months ago, my husband died and I was very lonely. So, I came here (El Achiotal), where my sisters live. But after a while I decided to go back, because my sisters gave me everything and I felt like I had to earn my own living. And after only two weeks of being back in my own village, this happened. I stayed in my house. When the water came up to here (chest high), I climbed into my hammock, which I had tied up as high as I could. But when I saw that the water rose even more, I decided to get out. I reached for a chair. I almost fell! Many had gone to the school, but I decided to go back to my sisters. I thought that maybe the water hadn’t entered there. I left on Sunday morning and when I got here, I saw that they were also evacuating people. It’s pure luck that I found my sisters! And now, where they are, I’ll be. Because I have nowhere to go. I’m all alone, without my husband, without my home, without my house.”
“We had gone to dig up turtle eggs. We were on our way back and we saw the water coming. First a little bit, and then it rose to our knees. We were seven all together, riding our bikes. When the water rose up to our chests, we had to throw our bikes on our shoulders. After one hour we could barely go on, our legs hurt too much! The bike is the only thing that I could save; I left it in a house where almost no water entered. But apart from that, I’ve lost everything, my little shack, the metal sheets, everything is gone. Just a pool of muddy water is left behind.”
“I called 911 and they said ‘Have patience. We’ll get there.’ In the mean time, we climbed onto a beam. The water was already chest high. At five o’clock a brother from the church came and he took one of my boys. I carried the other one. The water was already above their heads. We can’t live here anymore. The mud came above the windows, everything is destroyed. And we have no income. Normally we live from working in the sugar cane fields, but now, the harvest is ruined too.”
]]>While the team was at the mayor’s office, news arrived that two more bodies had been found—one of them, a 5-year old girl--which brought the number of dead to 16. Ten people remain missing.
“Seeing the devastation to the town caused by the enormous boulders, rivers of mud, and rubble that swept through I was surprised—and grateful—that the human cost wasn’t higher,” said one team member.
Living through the disaster was clearly a nightmare—the story of Emerita Rivas, 26, made that clear. The Oxfam team met her that day at the mayor’s office where she had been working for just two months when the disaster struck. Smiling and intelligent, she seemed already to be a crucial part of the local administration. She was meeting delegations, coordinating with the mayor and the secretary, and keeping tabs on where to send humanitarian aid.
Here is her account of the early morning hours of November 8 when the landslide hit:
“It was one in the morning and we heard a noise that sounded like heavy machinery that was getting close to us. But it was the mud and the rocks that were coming. We left quickly to knock on doors so that people would leave. Soon, we also heard the whistles, the sign that everyone had to get out. Ever since the earthquakes in 2001, people have been organized into eight sectors, and every sector has a leader.
“At around two in the morning, police cars and private cars started to arrive in order to bring people to the shelters, but there wasn’t anything there—the mats didn’t come until Monday. Thank God, the area where we live was not affected and we could help out during the emergency. We spent all day Sunday evacuating people. There were many injured people. People had to go up on the roofs or hang onto the walls, and those walls have broken glass in order to prevent robberies.
“Even though our neighborhood wasn’t affected, I am also sleeping in the shelter, because I am still afraid. Many people have suffered nervous breakdowns. One neighborhood and the town center ended up completely destroyed and the authorities have said that it’s not a good idea to rebuild the town.”
]]>Torrential rains the previous weekend triggered the landslide and spread devastation across El Salvador. The disaster has left 184 people dead, and in Verapaz alone, more than 800 people have sought refuge in shelters.
Oxfam has been responding to the disaster by providing hygiene kits, water tanks, stoves, and kitchen utensils. The organization is now helping about 4,200 people and assessing the damage to determine how best to provide support as communities work to recover.
]]>Cars lie twisted and half-buried in the mud.
White-capped waves appear in the torrent of water that sweeps past a gas station.
The scenes from the floods and landslides that struck El Salvador last weekend reflect a storm of almost unbelievable intensity.
“In San Vincente, more than a foot of rain fell in just four hours,” says Carolina Castrillo, regional director for Oxfam America.
These have been the deadliest rains since Central America’s storm of the century—Hurricane Mitch—struck El Salvador in 1998. More than 200 people are dead or missing, more than 2,000 houses have been damaged or destroyed, and crops that the rural population depends on for food have been obliterated.
“Where are we going to live, now that we have lost everything?” asked a woman in Verapaz, a town nearly destroyed by a landslide. “Where are we going to plant, what is going to happen to our lives?”
In the wake of Hurricane Mitch, many Salvadoran communities have joined forces with aid providers to reduce the deadly outcomes of violent storms and earthquakes. Over the past four years, Oxfam has supported local organizations to help form and train committees within the villages to operate early warning systems, develop evacuation plans, and administer first aid. This week, more than 70 Oxfam-supported community-protection committees were mobilized to help survivors reach the safety of shelters.
“Although this week’s storm was destructive, the partnership between aid providers and communities has made people less vulnerable than they were eleven years ago,” says Castrillo.
“Hurricanes, earthquakes, and landslides are all hazards in El Salvador, but the risks they pose to communities can be reduced,” she says. “That’s what we’re aiming for."
In the meantime, the needs on the ground are real and urgent, as survivors struggle to recover. Among their countless losses is peace of mind, as they live and relive the disaster. Days after the landslide, a boy from Verapaz describes his gripping fear: “I can’t speak because I feel my heart beating.”
Oxfam has built a warehouse stocked with emergency provisions in a disaster-prone area of El Salvador. In the November flood emergency, we were able to rush food, clean water, shelter materials, mattresses, first aid kits, and other essentials to shelters for displaced people, while making plans to help ensure longer-term food security when people return to their homes.
Donate now to Oxfam’s Global Emergency Response.
]]>The heavy rains that pummeled El Salvador on November 7 triggered deadly floods and landslides that have buried homes, collapsed bridges, and destroyed crops. By November 9, 130 people had died—many in a single devastating landslide—and more than 13,000 had fled to emergency shelters.
But it could have been worse. Oxfam and our local partners began helping communities prepare for this emergency long before it ever came to pass. Working in areas that are vulnerable to floods, landslides, and other hazards, our partners have helped villages form community-protection committees that they then provided with equipment and trainings in first aid, early-warning systems, shelter management, and evacuation planning. When the downpour began to signal danger, 71 Oxfam-supported community-protection committees swung into action and helped guide their people to safety.
Once in the shelter of schools and community buildings, many felt the impact of another Oxfam preparedness measure: a nearby warehouse stocked with essentials. Events like hurricanes and earthquakes that put communities at risk often damage and destroy the roads and bridges that connect them with outside help. The Oxfam warehouse, which is located in a hazardous region of the country, helped ensure that we could move emergency equipment to the shelters quickly and safely.
So when disaster struck, Oxfam aid reached three shelters in the hard-hit areas of Zacatecoluca, Melara, and Puerto La Libertad within hours of the arrival of displaced families. Industrial kitchen equipment and utensils and tanks of clean water helped ensure that there was food to eat and water to drink, and mattresses provided a measure of comfort.
Oxfam also quickly purchased materials for distribution, so other shelters in Zacatecoluca and San Salvador soon received deliveries of first aid kits, hygiene materials, and food, as well as pickaxes, wheelbarrows, and shovels to facilitate the clean-up effort around shelters.
Meanwhile, teams of staff and partners were fanning out across the affected areas to determine how best to meet the longer-term needs of those who have suffered the loss of homes and the means to make a living.
“Disaster preparedness can save lives and help alleviate suffering and economic losses,” says Oxfam America humanitarian response director Michael Delaney. “We hope our supporters will help us sustain and expand this program so we can continue to help communities and partners plan ahead.”
Read more about Oxfam’s preparedness work in El Salvador.
Donate now to Oxfam’s Global Emergency Response.
]]>That was 15 years ago. Today, clean water in the small communities of El Recuerdo and Agua Zarca is as precious as ever—and still hard to get. There's no turning on the tap over a kitchen sink and letting the gallons gush. Here, many people trudge to a communal source, fill their jugs, and lug the heavy load home again. But seasonal flooding—sometimes hugely destructive and, with climate change, possibly becoming more severe—contaminates many of the area's hand-dug wells, exposing people to waterborne illnesses.
But now, with the help of Oxfam America and its local partner, PROVIDA, the well that Cruz worked so hard to dig on the school grounds in El Recuerdo is pumping enough clean water to satisfy the drinking needs not only of the students but of about 80 families in the surrounding area. The well is one of five "healthy wells" in southern Zacatecoluca province PROVIDA lined, surrounded with a filter, capped to ensure its cleanliness, and outfitted with a pump that sends water to a large tank for chlorination and storage.
"The families in this area are living in extreme poverty, living as subsistence farmers or low paid day laborers in the nearby sugar cane plantations," says Karina Copen, an Oxfam humanitarian program officer. "They face numerous challenges in having to adapt to the increased frequency and intensity of the flooding in their area. With access to a healthy well, they can at least know that in the next flood, they will have a safe source of water for their families and the good health that comes along with it."
Adaptations, such as these healthy wells, are essential for Salvadoran families living in the department of La Paz in the lower region of the Lempa River where seasonal rains, tropical depressions, and hurricanes, make it one of the country's most flood-prone areas.
Coupled with those natural hazards is the fact that communities in the region have significantly less access to improved water sources and sanitation than other parts of the country. The "healthy wells" along with 27 new composting latrines have been a boon to families in the area.
"Kids are getting sick less; families are healthier," says Santos Efrain Coto, one of the local leaders in El Recuerdo. "When they drank contaminated water they got diarrhea and parasites."
The improved wells are based on a model that's new to El Salvador and designed by an organization called Swiss Labour Assistance. Besides having their tops sealed with cement to prevent polluted flood waters from slopping in, the wells are lined with a type of plastic pipe, known as polyvinyl chloride, or PVC, that extends down into the aquifer. Packed around the outside of the lining is a filter of volcanic rock that prevents contamination from seeping through underground.
At the El Recuerdo school one day recently, teacher Ana Elsa Cubias describes how students used to bring their own water from home to drink during the school day. Now, the refurbished well guarantees them a clean supply right on the spot.
"They're drinking water from a protected source and the kids have water right in the classroom," says Cubias.
A short distance from the classrooms sits a large plastic tank, sky blue and able to hold 1,100 liters of water pumped fresh from the well. Chlorinated, the water from the tank flows to two taps standing just outside the gates to the school. They're accessible to whoever is driving or walking by. And to ensure the stored water stays safe for drinking, the water committee arranges to have the tank cleaned every couple of weeks—a task that falls to a child small enough to wiggle inside and scrub the interior walls with a brush and bleach.
"We make sure he bathes before he gets in the tank," adds Coto, the local leader.
In Agua Zarca, a few communities over, Jose Luis Funes Cruze says that before PROVIDA and Oxfam installed the new well, most of the local residents depended on their own backyard wells for drinking water—and that was a problem.
"The household wells take on a lot of rain water and a lot of filthy water when there's flooding," says Cruz, pointing in the direction of the polluted San Antonio River, which spills its banks during big storms. "The things people throw in—there are pigs up river. And the cheese factory is up river."
In the past, when their drinking supply has been contaminated, families in Agua Zarca have had to rely on the government or aid groups to truck in drinking water for them.
But now, with a new communal well their supply of drinking water is much improved.
"We're very grateful—the whole community is—to have that water," says Blanca Lidia Jiménez, who lives close to the well makes about six trips a day to fetch enough water for the seven people in her house. "We don't get sick so much when we drink the water from this well. The little kids would get swollen bellies, but with the new well that problem has been solved."
Still, the situation in Agua Zarca points to the challenges of providing clean water in this area. The community's new well was built on the only land available: next to a cow pasture—an arrangement that could be problematic during the wet season when rain sloshes manure about and allows it to seep into the groundwater.
The deep plastic lining on the well and its volcanic-rock filter help, though, says Guillermo Morán, a professor and researcher at the University of El Salvador's Earth Sciences Institute. He worked with Oxfam America and another of its partners, the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative (HHI), to evaluate the effectiveness of the wells while studying the health practices of families who use them.
The study is an important component of Oxfam's public health work: It promotes accountability and offers a different model for aid groups by linking their work with that of universities.
"We have the field experience and they have the technical expertise," says Miriam Aschkenasy, Oxfam America's public health specialist. "Together we're able to evaluate programs at a higher standard and at one that increases accountability."
In its draft report, HHI said that individuals who live in communities with "healthy wells" were less likely to have diarrhea and reported fewer cases of the illness during the time of the study. But the draft report also revealed that in two of those communities, some people were still using hand-dug wells for their drinking water while other people from places without "healthy wells" were making the trek to a community that had one to fetch their water.
"The study gives us insight in a way we couldn't have anticipated," says Aschkenasy. "It gives us an idea of where to focus in the future. We now know we need to find a way to encourage people who are still relying on the hand-dug wells to use the healthy ones instead. And it gives us great incentive to build more of them."
]]>Only hours before, news of a double disaster had reached Oxfam America's office in San Salvador. A volcanic eruption, followed by an earthquake of magnitude 6.0 had launched an exodus from the capital city. Hundreds of thousands of people were on the move, rushing from collapsed homes to ill-equipped shelters on the outskirts of town. Oxfam staff scrambled to respond, contacting local partner organizations, government offices, and the UN to begin coordinating aid delivery.
It was a scene from a major disaster. Or perhaps not.
Outside Oxfam's San Salvador office, it was a peaceful day. The loudest sound was the whistling of a flock of clarineros in the trees, not the blaring horns of desperate drivers, and there was no sign that the ground beneath the neighboring buildings had slipped and shuddered.
In fact, this was a scene from a disaster simulation—an elaborate fabrication designed to ensure that the Oxfam staff are poised to respond quickly and effectively in a major emergency. The staff had gathered in the office that morning knowing a "disaster" was coming their way but with no idea what it would turn out to be, until "news flashes" began revealing an emergency that appeared to threaten both the city and the office itself.
First things first: in the simulation as she would in real life, Regional Director Susan Bird made sure all the Oxfam staff and their families were safe. Then she and her staff launched an all-out effort to get aid to the affected communities.
Yet, for hours—just as in real-life emergencies—there were 20 important questions for every answer available. How many people have been affected? Where are they moving to? Who's been left behind? What are the most urgent needs? What are the government and other NGOs planning to do? What support do our partner organizations need to begin delivering aid? Are the displaced people safe? Who needs our help the most? What's our plan of action?
"It's crazy. The numbers are changing every five minutes. It's difficult to get a grasp of what's really going on," said communications officer Tjarda Muller.
"In real emergencies, we have to be swift and coordinated. Lives depend on it." — Dawit Beyene, Oxfam America's deputy director of humanitarian response
Soon, Vanessa Lanza from Oxfam's Boston office was stretched to the limit in her role as staff member of a partner organization, trying to learn about the most urgent needs on the ground as she pulled together a sketch of how many families her group could assist with what kind of aid, along with a budget to submit to aid agencies she hoped would support her. "This is hard. I have so much to do. It's chaos for a partner to respond to the community and at the same time to coordinate all the sources of funding."
In another office, key emergencies staff met with the director to hammer out Oxfam's plan of action.
"We need to look at the risks people are facing," said Susan Bird. The plan would have to consider the potential for looting, aftershocks, crowding, lack of water, disease outbreaks, and violence.
"We're talking about 300,000 displaced people," Enrique Garcia, Oxfam's Regional Humanitarian Coordinator, reminded the group. He described the chaos that can ensue when even relatively small numbers of people gather at emergency shelters like gyms and schools.
The initial action plan began to emerge: the government had announced it would supply aid to the large shelters for displaced people, so Oxfam decided to focus its resources on the under-served groups gathering in informal shelters. But delivering aid after disasters is never simple. Latrines would be crucial for sanitation, but digging pits or trenches would be impossible where people were gathering in paved, urban settings. And the displaced groups would need plenty of clean water for drinking, cooking, and washing, but the staff had learned from past experience that there aren't enough tanker trucks in El Salvador to transport the water that would be needed.
"We'll have to bring trucks in from Guatemala," said Garcia.
Every now and then laughter rippled through the offices as staff members circulated offbeat messages and photos to ease the tension.
But for some, it was hard to keep in mind that this wasn't a real emergency. At age 52, Oxfam staffer Milagro Orellana (or Niña Mila, as she is respectfully called) has experienced many disasters, and the simulation roused painful memories. She recalled the day in 2001 when a powerful earthquake struck El Salvador.
"It was a Saturday, and I had gone to Santa Tecla to buy supplies. When I returned, I heard this sound like a bomb had exploded. I was still on the bus, which was shaking. I saw walls falling down from houses. People started running all over the place. Since it hadn't been that long since the war ended, I thought maybe someone had bombed a building. I was very afraid for the lives of my children." She trembled as she spoke of it. "When I got home I found my family out in the street, screaming."
Oxfam helped her get back onto her feet after the real earthquake, and on this January day she was pleased to help the office hone its skills for future emergencies.
At 4:30 in the afternoon, the organizers brought the simulation to a close. The action plan was complete, the partners had been activated, and the Oxfam response was up and running. The first two days of a disaster response had been squeezed into seven hours, but from the look of the tired faces, some of the staff might as well have lived through 48 hours of a real-time emergency.
Next on their agenda: the crucial final day of the exercise, where the office would map out a plan to improve its disaster readiness.
"It really put us in the mindset of a major emergency and allowed us to have a good look at what we're doing right, and what things we need to do better," said Susan Bird. "In this case, when the stress got too intense, we could remember that it was just an exercise. In a real emergency, we know there are people out there who need our help, and we need to be as prepared as possible to deliver it quickly and effectively."
Niña Mila looked relieved at the end of the day. "I feel good. It was a big experience for me. It made me feel like how I would actually act in a real emergency. I had no idea I could do this. So thank you."
]]>Three people died (including a four-year-old boy, his 14-year-old brother, and their father) and 80 people have taken shelter in the church in the city of Berlin. At the temporary shelter there is a pressing need for drinking water, dry and clean clothes, blankets, personal hygiene kits, mattresses, and medicine. As a first response to this local emergency, Oxfam directed a $12,000 to its partner organizations to provide clothing and hygiene kits, as well as water and sanitations equipment such as 20-liter water tanks for each family to store clean water.
Forecasts call for more heavy rains in the coming days. Oxfam’s partner organizations continue to evacuate communities at risk.
Each year people who live in conditions of poverty confront emergency situations. Because they lack resources, they are forced to construct their homes of weak materials in precarious places, where lands are cheap or abandoned. This makes them more vulnerable to heavy rains.
Oxfam works with organizations to prepare these communities to confront disasters and mitigate the damage they cause. In group training sessions they draw risk maps, form early warning, emergency, and first aid committees, and identify buildings in safer areas that can function as shelters. Once organized and trained, the communities can confront an eventual emergency in a coordinated fashion. Additionally, when organized and trained, these communities are more empowered to demand their rights and do advocacy work with national organizations to achieve changes in the current civil defense law, which gives communities a limited role.
]]>On January 13, 2001, a powerful earthquake shook El Salvador. In San José Costa Rica, houses collapsed, many residents suffered broken bones, and a four-year-old girl was killed. The main road was destroyed, so for a time the community was cut off from outside help.
In the aftermath of the 2001 earthquake, Oxfam teamed up with local partner REDES with the goal of helping Costa Rica and many other Salvadoran communities prevent future earthquakes, hurricanes, and other natural events from becoming full-scale disasters.
The REDES program in Costa Rica is grounded in a community emergency committee whose members have taken charge of evacuation, communications, shelter, first aid, and other key tasks. After mapping out the risks and resources of the village, REDES and the committee developed an emergency-response plan designed to ensure that everyone—including those living in hazardous locations and people with limited mobility—could reach safety in the early hours of an emergency. A two-way radio was installed, providing the community with access to the REDES base, which is staffed 24 hours a day to handle emergency communications. REDES trained community members in first aid and other skills that are essential for first responders, and the community held drills to simulate emergencies.
In October of 2005, Hurricane Stan pounded El Salvador and put Costa Rica's preparations to the test. High winds, heavy rains, landslides, and washed-out roads that isolated the village all portended tragedy, yet the town suffered no deaths or serious injuries. At a gathering of the community's emergency committee and Oxfam and REDES staff, we heard about what happened from the people who lived through it.
As quickly as possible after the hurricane struck, Claudia Dalila Sánchez, who headed up the evacuation committee, led her team on a tour of the community. They evacuated people trapped by landslides and caught in other precarious situations, and they monitored the rising waters of Lago de Ilopango. "When the earthquake happened, we didn't know enough," she said. "For Stan, we had better information about how to take people out of danger."
"In both the 2001 earthquake and Hurricane Stan, the roads were destroyed so no vehicles could come in," explained Miguel Martínez, San José Costa Rica's emergency committee coordinator. "But the difference with Stan was that we were organized. After the earthquake, people didn't have the consciousness to help each other, but after Stan, the community was united. We scheduled turns so people could work on the road, and in a short time, we were able to clear it."
Carmen Sosa is a shy woman who waited until all seven of the committee leaders had spoken before telling her story. "During the earthquake, we didn't know what to do. My house fell. My husband was hurt by a roof tile that fell on his head. And since I didn't know what to do, I just cried. I saw all my things destroyed and thought, 'This is it. I don't have anything left.' But since REDES has given us training, we now know what we can do in these cases."
Carmen concluded with a self-assured smile that left us feeling that something about this program—either the new skills she's learned or the knowledge that she no longer has to face emergencies alone—has added a measure of confidence to her life.
Oxfam's partners work in many communities around the country, helping them take charge effectively at times of emergency. But our program goes far beyond teaching the nuts and bolts of emergency response: one of our partners co-authored a law that has created a role for communities in El Salvador's national system of disaster preparedness and response, and which requires for the first time that disaster preparedness be incorporated into development planning.
"We are working to help impoverished communities gain both the skills and the voice in the political process that they need to prevent future emergencies from becoming disasters," says Michael Delaney, Oxfam America's Director of Humanitarian Response. "So far, signs point to success."
Working through REDES and other partners, Oxfam America's disaster risk reduction programs in El Salvador are now reaching an estimated 200,000 people.
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