Haitian Native, Wyclef Jean Tweets from Quake Ravaged Haiti

by Alicia Cruz
Theblackurbantimes

Grammy Award winning Hip Hop artist and producer, Wyclef Jean, a native of Croix-des-Bouquets, Haiti a northern suburb of the capital city, Port-Au-Prince, has started a mass movement of aid for his native country in the wake of the worst earthquake to hit the Caribbean nation in 25 years.

His tweets have been re-tweeted over and over again. Traffic to his Yele Haiti site was so overwhelming that it shut the site down for awhile today. Jean left the U.S. for the Dominican Republic sometime during the wee hours of this morning. Since the airport is Port-au-Prince has been shut down, direct flights into the ravaged nation are not available.

The Black Urban Times continues to follow the singer's tweets as he attempts to lend aid and muster support from fellow Haitians living in the states as well as all Americans to help get aid to the thousands who have been left homeless and dispossessed as a result of yesterday's 7.0 magnitude quake.

Donate $5 to Jean's Haitian charity, Yéle Haiti, by texting "YELE" to 501501.

Poet and musician, Nuage, a native Haitian now living in Gloucester, Ontario Canada emailed the Black Urban Times saying, "Since last night we are making progress. Tomorrow night we are having a fund raiser at the Babylon nightclub here which will be hosted by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. Thank you for the love and energy!"

This morning, President Barack Obama said Haitians will have the "full support" of the United States. During his speech, the president said, "This is a time when we are reminded of the common humanity we all share," Obama told reporters in the White House Diplomatic Reception Room. "With just a few hundred miles of ocean between us," he said, "Haitians are our neighbors in the Americas and here at home. We have to be with them in their hour of need." Stay tuned to the Black Urban Times for updates on this major story.

Click here to visit Wyclef Jean's Yele Haiti charity.

Crisis Haiti: Earthquake 2010

by Alicia Cruz
Editor-in-Chief

The Black Urban Times

In a span of five minutes, the worst earthquake in 200 years rocked Haiti causing what news correspondents have described as "billions of dollars" in damages. Power supply and phone lines are down. Thousands are feared dead, injured and/or missing after a 7.0 magnitude quake hit approximately 10 miles southwest of the Caribbean nation's capital city of Port-au-Prince on Tuesday.


Raymond Joseph, Haiti's ambassador to the U.S., said the Presidential Palace, the tax office, the Ministry of Commerce and the Foreign Ministry had all been badly damaged. These were among the most sturdiest of structures in the city so the world can only imagine the state of utter devastation the country's residential housing are in.
Ambassador Joseph said that Haitian President Rene Preval and his wife both survived the quake.


Efforts to get injured residents to hospitals have been hampered by streets blocked by rubble from collapsed buildings.
Aftershocks continued to rock the city every 15 to 20 minutes lasting anywhere from three to five seconds. The first aftershock was said to have been the strongest and caused buildings to crumble throwing people onto the streets. Houses that once lined a hillside now lay in depredation in a ravine.

As night fell, chaos and confusion increased. Rachmani Domersant, an operations manager with the Food for the Poor charity who is situated in the hillside suburb of Petionville said: "You have thousands of people sitting in the streets with nowhere to go. There are people running, crying, screaming. People are trying to dig victims out with flashlights. I think hundreds of casualties would be a serious understatement."


The offices of the World Bank in Haiti were destroyed, but a Reuters report said that most of the staff had been accounted for.

The local headquarters for the UN in Haiti issued a statement via the New York UN stating that the building had sustained serious damage along with other UN installations and a large number of UN personnel were unaccounted for.

Mike Blanpied of the US Geological Survey told BBC news, "This quake occurred under land as opposed to off-shore, so a lot of people were directly exposed to the shaking coming off that earthquake fault, which was quite shallow. Based on the location and size of the quake, about three million people would have been severely shaken by its impact."

CNN reports stated the monstrous quake was felt as far as Cuba.
Haiti, which occupies the western third of the Island of Hispaniola, is the second poorest country in the world following Nicaragua so it is likely they will require international aid for years to come in order to dig themselves out from under this catastrophe.

As the night wears on, the trepidation of millions of native Haitians living in the U.S. grows as they wait to hear of the well-being of family members in Haiti.
Native Haitian, music artist and poet, Nuage resides in Gloucester, Ontario Canada and has family in Haiti. She says, "I'm devastated. Communication is down and its dark. It's late and we are not sleeping."

Reports filter in from different news sources indicating that by first light, aid and rescue workers will be better able to apprise the world of the verity of this catastrophe.


In the immediate aftermath of the quake, news stringers reported that the Port-au-Prince airport, while not badly damaged, was closed and would remain close until thoroughly inspected.

Passengers were boarding American Airlines Flight 1908 in Haiti when the earthquake struck on Tuesday.
The Miami, Florida bound flight was scheduled to depart Haiti at 5:30 p.m. but fearing damage to the runway, the flight was delayed and did not takeoff until 6:45 p.m. after damage to the runway was accessed.

American Airline spokeswoman Andrea Huguely said, 49 passengers and 11 crew members landed safely at the Miami airport at 8:33 p.m. The flight was originally set to carry 176 passengers, but many opted to stay behind.

Spirit Airlines based out of Miramar, Florida issued a statement indicating that it "is working on a relief effort" for Haiti and added that they planned to reinstate their Fort Lauderdale to Haiti flights as soon as the airport in Port-au-Prince opens.


Producer and musician, Wyclef Jean, a native of Croix-des-Bouquets, Haiti asked Haitian-Americans and Americans to band together and help those in need in Haiti.

In 2004, Jean, along with cousin Jerry 'Wonder' Duplessis and humanitarian experts Sanjay Rawal and Natabara Rollosson, created a non-political organization called Yéle Haiti.


Jean said his vision was to provide humanitarian aid to Haiti; to empower his people and the Haitian diaspora to have hope as they rebuild and restore pride across Haiti. The multi- platinum producer and former member of The hit group Fugees is boarding a plane to the Dominican Republic headed for his native land as we speak.

Jean became a roving ambassador for Haiti in 2007. Click here to read Wyclef's statement on the earthquake in Haiti.

SUPPORT PROJECT YELE HAITI. CLICK HERE

The U.S. has set up a toll-free number for people who have family or friends in Haiti and are trying to find out if they are OK. Please call 1-888-407-4747.

WYCLEF: "WE NEED AID IMMEDIATELY"

Massive 7.0 Earthquakes Rattles Haiti

ASSOCIATED PRESS

EDITOR'S NOTE: Music artist Wyclef Jean asks that you Text YELE 501501 on your phone (a charge of $5.00 will be applied) to send support to those suffering in Haiti as a result of this devastating earthquake.

MEXICO CITY — A mighty earthquake rocked the tiny, impoverished island nation of Haiti Tuesday, collapsing a hospital, the presidential palace and major buildings like offices, hotels and shops, possibly burying thousands of people beneath the rubble in what one diplomat called a "catastrophe."

The quake, one of the most powerful ever in the region — measuring a preliminary magnitude of 7.0 and centered about 10 miles west of Port-au-Prince, a city of 2 million — had a shallow depth of just five miles. It struck at 4:53 p.m., followed by several strong aftershocks.

AFP/Getty Images

Haitians standing amid rubble after a 7.0 earthquake rocked the impoverished Caribbean nation.

Photos: 7.0 Earthquake Rocks Haiti

AFP/Getty Images

Hatians react to the huge quake that toppled buildings and is causing widespread damage and panic.

Photos: 7.0 Earthquake Rocks Haiti

The UN says the headquarters of the United Nations stabilization mission in Haiti, which has a 9,000-strong peacekeeping force, sustained "serious damage," leaving a large number of UN personnel unaccounted for.

“The whole city is in darkness, you have thousands of people sitting in the streets, with nowhere to go,” Rachmani Domersant, an operations manager with Foor for the Poor, told Reuters.

“I’ve seen 7 to 8 buildings, from office buildings to hotels and shopping stores, collapsed ... I think hundreds of casualties would be a serious understatement,” he told Reuters.

PHOTOS: AFTERMATH OF HAITI EARTHQUAKE

As night fell on the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince and other towns, reports of extensive destruction were trickling out. Tsunami alerts were issued for Cuba, the Bahamas and much of the Caribbean.

All of that augured vast damage and overwhelming casualties. Electricity was out Tuesday night through the darkened capital, phone lines were down, and the airport was shut. Screams for help seeped from felled buildings, and chaos reigned.

"I can hear very distressed people...a lot of distress, people wailing, trying to find loved ones trapped under the rubble," Ian Rodgers, with Save the Children in Port-au-Prince, told CNN by telephone.

In Washington, President Barack Obama pledged to help the crippled country.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, in remarks before a speech in Hawaii, said the U.S. was assessing the situation and "is offering our full assistance to Haiti and to others in the region."

"We will be providing both civilian and military disaster relief and humanitarian assistance," Clinton said. "And our prayers are with the people who have suffered, their families and their loved ones."

A spokesman for the U.S. Southern Command, which oversees American military operations in the Caribbean and South America, said officials are assessing what assistance or aid might be needed.

"We are monitoring the situation and staying in close contact with the State Department," said Jose Ruiz, a spokesman for the command.

The Associated Press said its reporters saw a hospital collapse in the wealthy suburb of Petionville that overlooks the capital.

A spokeswoman for Catholic Relief Services said the group's representative in Haiti, Karel Zelenka, described "total disaster and chaos" before the telephone line went dead. Zelenka told colleagues that the Haitian capital was covered in dust.

"He estimates there must be thousands of people dead," the spokeswoman, Sara Fajardo, said in an interview from the group's office in Maryland.

Fajardo said the group has stockpiles of food and other goods to serve 5,000 families but that aid workers are concerned that relief efforts could be impaired by poor road conditions and lack of security.

"Within a minute of the quake . . . soil, dust and smoke rose up over the city, a blanket that completely covered the city and obscured it for about 12 minutes until the atmospheric conditions dissipated the dust," Mike Godfrey, who works as a contractor for USAID, told CNN from Port-au-Prince.

"I think it is really a catastrophe of major proportions," said Haiti's ambassador to the U.S., Raymond Joseph.

People communicating by Twitter said that while they felt the quake in the Haitian city of Cap Haitien, in the north, there was little damage.

Haiti is the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere and one of the poorest in the world. Already battered in recent years by storms, military coups and gang violence, much of Haiti is a hodgepodge of slums, poor construction and people living on the edge.