Mon, Dec 29, 2003
Assessment Team Flies to Kerman Province
AmeriCares, one of the nation's
largest international humanitarian relief organizations, is
dispatching an emergency response team to southeastern Iran, where
a quake measuring at least 6.3 on the Richter scale has killed an
estimated 20,000 and injured 50,000.
The quake struck near the ancient fort city of Bam on Friday at
approximately 5:30 am local time. Bam is located roughly 600 miles
southeast of Tehran. More than 90 percent of the Old City of Bam
(dating back 2,000 years) was destroyed. Officials estimate 70
percent of the homes in the surrounding region have been flattened
along with local hospitals.
In response to the disaster, AmeriCares is sending relief
workers to Iran and making preparations to fill a cargo jet with
medicines, bandages, tents, water purification systems and other
trauma equipment for a tentative departure date of Tuesday evening
of the 31st.
Bam is home to 90,000 people with another 200,000 residing in
neighboring villages. The quake destroyed much of the city's
historic landmark -- a giant 2,000-year-old citadel made of
mud-brick, overlooking the Old City. Until the quake, it was the
largest mud structure in the world.
In June 1990, AmeriCares airlifted volunteer doctors and relief
supplies to Iran, when nearly 40,000 were killed in a massive
earthquake measuring 7.7 that struck 175 miles northwest of Tehran.
It was the first flight to originate from the United States and
land on Iranian soil following the Iranian hostage crisis, which
ended in 1981.
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