Haiti earthquake: Warren Airman supports global relief effort

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman Daryl Knee
  • 90th Missile Wing Public Affairs
F. E. WARREN AIR FORCE BASE, WYO. --  "We are just now beginning to learn the extent of the devastation," said President Barack Obama, "but the reports and images that we've seen of collapsed hospitals, crumbled homes and men and women carrying their injured neighbors through the streets are truly heart-wrenching.

"Indeed, for a country and a people who are no strangers to hardship and suffering, this tragedy seems especially cruel and incomprehensible," he continued. "Our thoughts and prayers are also with the many Haitian Americans around our country who do not yet know the fate of their families and loved ones back home."

On Jan. 12, 2010, an earthquake more powerful than the San Francisco Bay Area quake of 1989 occurred in the nation of Haiti, affecting an estimated 3 million people.

Late that night, Tech. Sgt. Richard Sainte-Rose, a Haiti native assigned to the 90th Medical Operations Squadron, called his family.

"It was utter chaos," he said. "I wanted to know if they were okay, but of course no one knew where everyone was."

The next day, Sergeant Sainte-Rose asked his supervisor if he could go to help out the relief effort. After approval from his supervisor and Col. Francesca Vasta-Falldorf, 90th Medical Group commander, the sergeant's name was sent out to the major command as a volunteer.

"I'm from the area, I speak the language and I know the culture," he said. "It just made sense."

Within four days, he was tasked with a temporary-duty assignment as an interpreter in support of the United States Naval Ship Comfort, a vessel which provides mobile surgical hospital service during times of disaster or humanitarian relief.
Sergeant Sainte-Rose arrived in Haiti Jan. 28.

"It was total devastation," the sergeant said. "Some of the streets and neighborhoods I grew up in were completely gone, entirely leveled."

His team, an expeditionary hospital, had already begun operations. The way it worked, he said, was that the USNS Comfort performed all of the surgeries but had no room aboard for aftercare. The patients transitioned from the vessel to the mobile hospital units, which could hold about 20 people overnight.

At any given time, there were about 16 patients being seen for aftercare, he said.

The work Sergeant Sainte-Rose performed as an interpreter involved telling patients they were discharged from the hospital, which occurred at the patient's two-week mark in the hospital.

"One child in particular about broke my heart," he said.

There was a girl Sergeant Sainte-Rose said had lost most of her family, both of her arms and one leg. The team had to tell her that she couldn't stay at the hospital any more.

The discharged patients were asked if they had anywhere to go. If they had homes, they could return if able, but those whose homes were destroyed had to make do with their surroundings.

"It broke my heart," he said.

After weeks of support, the crew of the USNS Comfort discharged all of their patients. Until the time to go home, Sergeant Sainte-Rose's team from the mobile hospital helped out with local organizations explaining preventative healthcare methods.

Sergeant Sainte-Rose returned to America March 7, but he said he regrets that there was not more time to help.

"Even weeks after the earthquake, you could still smell the bodies trapped under the rubble and debris," he said. "The temperature reached more than 90 degrees during the day, and it rained almost every night."

"That's a recipe for disaster," he continued.

From what Sergeant Sainte-Rose could tell, there was not a home undamaged. Amazingly, though, Haiti's General Hospital, the hospital for Port-au-Prince, was not destroyed.

"It was as if by the grace of God that this building did not collapse," Sergeant Sainte-Rose said. "Had it caved in ... there would not have been the same care for all Haitians."

During a time where Sergeant Sainte-Rose was not interpreting for his team, he visited the courtyard of the General Hospital.

"There were so many people waiting for care," he said. "There were too many for the doctors to see. So, they waited.

"People whose injuries were much more severe than an amputation waited in the courtyard," he continued. "Unfortunately, some did not make it."
They died right there.

"You can't really prepare for something like this," he said about his emotional state. "Instead, you have to step outside of your comfort zone.

"I mean, there were times when we would get done with a 12-hour shift and go back to our tents and cry through the night," he said.

It was not a fun period, but he said he knew the importance of what he was doing.