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Beijing, 21 Aug (Xinhua) -- Carrying 28 tons of rice, 5 tons of red beans, and more than 5,000 liters of cooking oil, four trucks set off from Port-au-Prince, the capital of Haiti, on 20 August and rushed to the area hit hard by the Haitian earthquake.
This is the second batch of materials shipped by Chinese-funded enterprises and overseas Chinese in Haiti to the disaster area. After the earthquake, local Chinese-funded enterprises participated in the rescue for the first time and successfully rescued those who returned to life; local overseas Chinese and Ethnic Chinese raised funds and materials for the first time to purchase disaster relief materials. In the ranks of the disaster areas in Haiti, people saw many Chinese figures.
The Voice of China in the Search and Rescue Site
A magnitude 7.2 earthquake struck the western part of Haiti on the morning of the 14th. A Chinese construction company participated in the earthquake rescue in Leangle, a southern province 80 kilometers from the epicenter, and successfully rescued 1 person from the rubble.
Rescuers clear rubble in Leangle, Haiti, on Aug. 15. Photo by Jiang Hong
Jiang Hong, project manager of Zhejiang Wenling Hongyuan Traffic Engineering Company, recalled the search and rescue work that was racing against time.
At the time of the earthquake, the company's construction crew was preparing for construction on a local bridge project. Jiang Hong said: "At that time, I arranged construction on the construction site. The shaking was first slight, and then suddenly it began to shake violently. I realized that the earthquake had occurred, and I quickly lay down on the ground, and the shaking lasted for about ten seconds. For safety reasons, he and his colleagues stopped their work and returned to the camp. As soon as I entered the gate, I met the local police officer who came over and said, "The church has fallen, and someone is buried in it."
"The time to save people after the earthquake is urgent!" Jiang Hong immediately deployed an excavator, two dump trucks, a forklift and a refueling truck, and called his colleagues to accompany the police to the search and rescue scene.
Jiang Hong recalled that when he arrived at the scene, he saw someone crying and shouting on the ruins of the collapsed church, and anxious local people spontaneously carried out freehand rescue. Seeing that some equipment had arrived, some people immediately came to seek help and cooperated with Chinese personnel to save people.
"A little higher!" "Reverse, down" "Pull the rope!" "It's out!" Jiang Hong and his colleagues used Chinese mixed with the not-so-skilled Clio language, and cooperated with the local people to work under the scorching sun for nearly 4 hours, and finally successfully rescued 1 survivor and exhumed the remains of 13 victims.
A man clears the rubble of a house in Lechai, Haiti, on August 17. Xinhua News Agency (Photo by David Drapas)
After clearing the rubble, the company's employees also helped the local government clear the road to Lekai, the capital of the southern province.
Chinese signature of the collective letter
In a donation letter handed to Haiti's Planning Ministry, the names of Chinese were densely signed. The signatories were overseas Chinese living and working in Haiti. They raised two tranches of donations and relief supplies in the days following the earthquake.
Employees of Chinese enterprises loaded and transported the materials purchased by overseas Chinese in Haiti to the disaster area. Images courtesy of respondents
After the earthquake, Dong Zhengdong, the general manager of Haitian Overseas Chinese and Zhejiang Wenling Hongyuan Traffic Engineering Company, immediately contacted the food suppliers who cooperated on weekdays to urgently purchase 12 tons of rice, which was transported to the disaster area on the fourth day after the earthquake.
Hearing this news, Jin Xin, another overseas Chinese leader who also wanted to help the disaster area at the first time, sent a message in the WeChat group of Haitian Chinese businessmen, saying that he wanted to donate some food to the disaster area.
"I'll donate one too!" ...... In less than ten minutes, there was a long queue of solitaires in the WeChat group.
"The rice oil in the buyer's warehouse is about to be emptied by us. Locals usually eat red bean rice, so this time we mainly purchase rice, red beans and cooking oil after raising funds. Dong Zhengdong said.
On the 20th, they loaded 28 tons of rice, 5 tons of red beans and more than 5,000 liters of cooking oil onto trucks transported to the disaster area.
After handing over the supplies to Yeri Chandler, the chief executive of the Haitian National Civil Defence Office, Dong Zhengdong began to plan how to get more tents.
"After the earthquake tent must be the most urgently needed, but this kind of unpopular goods merchants have almost no inventory." We are thinking of other ways to solve this problem. Dong Zhengdong said.
Jin Xin, who runs a small commodities wholesale market in Haiti, mobilized his own employees to collect donations. "Although the number of overseas Chinese in Haiti is not large, everyone is very united, and we have also contributed to haiti's fight against the epidemic before."
People walk the streets of Lekai near the Sea earthquake on Aug. 18. Xinhua News Agency (Photo by David Drapas)
Ma Lijuan, the head of the Chinese side of the Confucius Classroom in Haiti, also participated in the disaster relief activities of donating money and materials for the first time. She said that Haiti was hit by strong earthquakes and hurricanes in just a few days, and overseas Chinese and ethnic Chinese who were concerned about the disaster area wrote their concern for the affected people in a collective letter and submitted it to the Haitian Planning Department.
The letter reads, "We donated money to purchase the food urgently needed by the people in the disaster area, and hope that our move will help everyone..." (Reporters: Chen Yao, Li Jiaxu, Wang Zhongyi, Carolina Ndala, David Drapas; Video Editor: Li Jiaxu; Editor: Wang Shen, Xu Xiaolei, Xie Binbin)
Produced by the International Department of Xinhua News Agency
Produced by Xinhua News Agency's International Communication Integration Platform