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Pakistan

ACT Rapid Response Payment Request No. 26/2008: Balochistan Earthquake, Pakistan

Attachments

Funds Sent To: Church World Service

  • Pakistan/Afghanistan (CWS-P/A) and Norwegian Church Aid (NCA)

Amount Sent: CWS P/A: US$ 31,167

NCA: US$ 29,238

Date: 31 October 2008

Details of Response

Emergency: Balochistan Earthquake, Pakistan

Date of Emergency: 29 October 2008

Implementing Member(s): Church World Service Pakistan/Afghanistan, Norwegian Church Aid

Implementing Partners:

For CWS - Strengthening Participatory Organization (SPO) recognised as a leading proponent of participatory development in Pakistan and is engaged in capacity building of community institutions throughout the country. SPO's presence at the grassroots, and its regular interaction and committed partnership with Community Based Organisations (CBOs) have, in turn, strengthened SPO's resolve to assist poor and disadvantaged sections of the communities to help achieve their goals for sustainable development under regular programming as well as at times of disasters. SPO works in five programmes:

For NCA - Taraqee Foundation (TF) - was established in 1994 to provide sanitation facilities to marginalized communities of Nawa Killi area in Quetta, Balochistan. It is one of the prominent non-profit organizations in Pakistan, providing need based service delivery to marginalized communities in eleven districts of Balochistan, three of Sindh and one of NWFP. TF's main programme sectors include: improving community physical infrastructure, relief and rehabilitation, micro finance and credit, basic health and education services, child protection and human and institutional development.

DETAILS OF THE EMERGENCY

A powerful earthquake hit the south-western Balochistan province of Pakistan on October 29, 2008. The epicenter of the quake was in Chiltan Mountains. The tremor struck 70km (45 miles) north of Quetta at 0409 (2309 GMT Tuesday) at a depth of 10 km (6.2 miles).

At least 160 people have been reported killed , and thousands of homes of mud and timber have been reduced to rubble. The areas hit by the earthquake are Pishin, Ziarat, Qila Abdullah, Chaman, Loralai, Sibbi, and Mastung. The worst-hit area appears to be Ziarat, about 50km north of Quetta, where hundreds of mostly mud and timber houses had been destroyed in five villages. The quake injured scores of people and triggered landslides that destroyed about 1,500 houses and blocked roads. Rescuers were still trying to reach some remote places in the mountains above the Ziarat valley, where many people are believed to be buried. Authorities were urgently trying to help about 12,000 homeless people and to bury the dead.

Many houses collapsed during the quake and some were destroyed in landslides that followed it. Stunned survivors spent the rest of the night in the open, with little more than the clothes in which they had been sleeping. The mountainous region is thinly populated and local infrastructure is poor, making it difficult to get a clear picture of the casualties.

Hospitals in the nearby town of Kawas and Quetta were flooded with the dead and injured.

According to the latest government information, the following districts of Baluchistan province are severely affected by the earthquake: Ziarat, Quetta, Sibi, Bolan, Chaman, Mastung, Qilla, Abdullah and Qalat