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WFP's logistics unit has been working on rehabilitating Mogadishu Port for two years. The port was severely damaged by the 2004 tsunami and by years of fighting and neglect.
Exactly ten years ago on a cool November morning a WFP chartered twin prop aircraft lifted off from Rome's Ciampino airport en route to Pristina, Kosovo. Onboard were WFP staff, Italian citizens and personnel from several other humanitarian organizations including several from the United Nation Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK). All had just made their way out of the city, along the roadway which cordons Rome and were on their way to a busy day inside the recent war zone.
Shortly after Tropical Storm Ketsana hit the northern Philippines and within days of Typhoon Parma making landfall on 3 October, WFP staff were on the phone with TNT personnel discussing with TNT the transport of 200 metric tonnes (MT) of High Energy Biscuits (HEBs) to support WFP operations in the devastated island nation.
In his second post from the field, WFP's Deputy Chief of Aviation, Philippe Martou writes to tell us about the role that he and his team played at the beginning of the week in an urgent food distribution program in the mountains east of Manila. The area was hit hard by Tropical Storm Ketsana in September and subsequent storms Parma and Lupit.
WFP's Deputy Chief of Aviation, Philippe Martou, wrote us last night about his experiences in the Philippines where WFP is providing helicopter airlift support to relief operations following Tropical Storm Ketsana and Typhoon Parma.
In Part I and Part II of this series we presented examples which made it clear why there is a need for standardizing the nomenclature and reference numbering of relief items.
In Part I of this series we sketched the outline of an imaginary emergency: A mountainous area in Central Asia had been hit by an earthquake causing major structural damage and significant loss of life. In our scenario the roads in the region were heavily damaged which limited access to the outside world and humanitarian relief efforts had kicked off with a massive airlift of relief items.
Earthquake in Faristan – Flash #1- October 3 2010 10:20 GMT.
Two hours ago, we experienced 7.8 earthquake with the epicenter in “Faraway”, one of the mountaneous regions in our country. We have reports of major structural damages and significant loss of life in the two district capitals, each with 200,000 inhabitants.
The structural damage includes destruction of vital road, power, communications, water and sanitation infrastructures. Houses and public facilities are said to have been severely damaged, if not totally destroyed.
I got to know WFP when I started as an aidworker for IFRC in Angola back in 1994. I remember the only way I could send my telecoms cargo to remote upcountry locations, was on planes managed by WFP and UNDPKO (UN peacekeeping). The only way I could fly to Ambriz, a totally isolated enclave north of Luanda, was with a WFP plane.
On August 6th, 2009 the bulk freighter M/V Yuehai, with 42,855 Metric Tons (MT) of wheat onboard, left the Port of Dunkerque bound for Karachi, Pakistan. For years various bulk shipments have made their way from this port bound for WFP programs around the world, but this time what would happen to this shipment at the other end was anything but routine.
