ITALY: L’Aquila Earthquake Assessment Update

We’ve been on the ground in Italy for four days (since Sunday, 19 April) assessing the L’Aquila 6.3 earthquake and the potential for a HODR volunteer response project. We've made considerable progress and contacts in the few long days we’ve been here, and we have met some challenges…

Agency Protection Civil (APC) is the Italian government agency with overall responsibility and control of the response. The affected areas have been blocked off, which makes it challenging for us to access the affected areas and move as freely as we'd like - even residents whose homes were damaged must be escorted by a firefighter to enter the disaster zone. APC has done an excellent job of providing emergency response of food, shelter, and damage assessment.

We met with Giovanni del Silbiero of APC, who was open and patient; however, we learned that nothing will be allowed without approval of APC and there seems no possibility of direct international volunteer participation without cooperation through a pre-approved Italian organization - Caritas and Red Cross are the largest.

In the past few days we’ve met with the Sulmona Lions Club, Bishop Angel Spina, and the Mayor of Rocco di Mezzo and today we’re meeting with Caritas. We have been welcomed warmly in these meetings, – the bishop had even printed out pages from our website! – but bottom line comes down to the need for APC approval, so we're working on potential collaboration with Caritas or another organization.

In addition to L’Aquila, there is major damage in Rocco di Cambio, Onna, San Gregorio and Saint Angelo. The weather has been cold and rainy, creating an even more difficult situation for the many people still in tents either because their homes were destroyed, or because they are waiting for APC inspection of their homes to be cleared for safe use.

If you’re interested in volunteering if we launch a project in Italy, please email Tom at info@HODR.org with ‘Italy’ in the subject line. To support HODR's response efforts please make a tax-deductible donation to our Disaster Response Fund today.

Follow our progress with real-time updates at twitter.com/HODRopsIN, view photos, and check back here for more information as it becomes available.

Thank you for supporting HODR!