Tsunami-Aceh Relief Website - "Request for Help"
Dear Drupal-ians
I need help to get a website going for a band of extraordinary volunteers helping with relief work in remote areas of SW Aceh.
Their current website is at: http://www.mentawai.com/aceh.html
THey have asked for construction of a more intuitive, facilitative website to expedite their endeavours, as they advance their mission to build a sea bridge of ships.
Their story is documented at: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6781502/site/newsweek/
If there are those among you who can help, pls contact me on: vernonadrianemuang@yahoo.com, email or via Y!IM.
A study of the website can determine what their needs are.
Thank you.
Peace - Vernon
+++
SUMATRA 9.0 EARTHQUAKE AND TSUNAMI EMERGENCY
"Boats are the only way to bring supplies in to sections of the SW Aceh coast where there are no roads and to the hundreds of islands to the West and South of what can only be described as ground zero. The US/AUS/UK/RI military will be stretched to deal with the carnage on the North West Coast and that area will continue to attract most of the attention and the bulk of the aid.
Our mission is to fill that gap starting with what we have at hand. We can make a real difference but we must move fast."
I've just mailed the
I've just mailed the addresses on that website offering webspace for at least six months, and drupal setup for free.
I also cc'ed you...
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www.symplification.com
Thanks
Thanks very much for your help. I have emailed this message back to you with other info.
I am trying to coordinate several other IT volunteers and so require that the Drupal sit on my domain.
If you have Y!IM we can all then work together virtually.
Hope to hear from you soon.
If there are others who think they can help Drupal or otherwise, please contact me as above.
Peace - V
I assume you're not charging
I assume you're not charging them anything?
Excuse me ...
I should burn in hell if I do.
For everyone's information - xand (despite his scepticism) and I are getting the drupal site going at http://www.defiantlabs.com/aceh
I am still open to others coming in to this project to expedite the site so that it can help facilitate as best for Rick and Jane.
THE ELECTRIC LAMB MISSION
http://www.tolong.net/electriclamb
I'd just like to announce: MISSION ACCOMPLISHED.
The site was up by midnight Saturday - just 6 hrs after xand and I connected.
The domain was rocking by Sunday midnight.
xand has been stupendous and we're now cyber-buddies!
Here's to Drupal and e-collaboration!
Peace - V
+++ Extract from Website
It is over 2 weeks since the earthquake and mega-tsunami, and our Padang-based boat, the Sumber Reziki is the first to reach Calang; a town mid way between Banda Aceh and Meulaboh.
What they find is shocking.
A thriving community of 15,000 has been very nearly erased. More than 6,000 are confirmed dead, over 4,000 are missing, 2,000 are living under tarps and and several thousand are camped in the hills terrified to return to ground zero.
Food is desperately short, people are drinking river water and disease has depleted the megre stock of drugs that have been air-dropped to the 20 or so overworked medics and aid workers in the area. The port infrastructure has vanished.
The navy ships and chopper support are focusing on Meulaboh but the reality is that there are thousands of people in smaller and more remote communities North and South who have not had any assistance since the quake.
Our mission is to build a Sea Bridge to Aceh, to reach the thousands who are homeless, hurt, hungry and traumatized.
We call this volunteer initiative "The Electric Lamb Mission",named for the first of our boats which left for 'Ground Zero' on 31 December 2004. Newsweek summarized our work: "The mission: establish a third channel into Aceh that could mean life or death for thousands of tsunami victims."
Our plan is simple.:
* An 800 ton mother-ship carrying 100+ medics and technicians, 200 tons of aid and equipment will motor from Padang and anchor close inshore.
* A fast ferry and aircraft will evacuate the sick or injured out to hospitals in Padang and return with fresh supplies and aid workers to replenish the mother-ship.
* A fleet of charter boats will distribute aid and medical support to communities up to 50 nm away.
* Beach landing boats will take aid ashore and shuttle the sick and injured to the Mother-ship clinic.
* Once other agencies arrive and can stabilize the coast, we will target Simeulue, Banyak, Nias islands and further south, focussing on stabilizing traumatized communities, disease control and helping to get basic infrastructure working.
* We are working with NGOs, and small but capable aid organizations and volunteer boat owners. We plan to always have our own capacity to fill in where people are in need and forgotten.
Thanks for your efforts and the donation of tolong.net
Alex and Vernon,
You are both professionals and you put together an impressive site in very little time. You truely earned your place as members and volunteers in support of our efforts. So have a great number of others who all came together to make ELM a reality and a huge success. 4 month have passed and we have delivered over 650mtons of aid, treated over 6,500 victims of the tsunami, supported populations of over 80,000 in remote areas, and pooled the resources and skill of over 180 field volunteers.
All of us appeal to both of you now as your peers and stakeholders in ELM. Please return tolong.net to all of us as the rightfull owners. You were custodians and you abused the trust we placed in you. To hijack our collective IP, our field reports written at the end of long and exhausting days in appalling conditions, our images, our audience and our energy the way you have, is very difficult for us to understand. Your are the only donors we have met who gave and then stole from us. Redeem your good names and spare a thought for the people we are helping. Be constructive and dare to air your problems in a public venue rather than to steal our website in the night and use it to hurt our aid effort. You are 5 people and we are hundreds! At no time did your little group constitute a majority of stakeholders.... never came close! Think! Please return the site to its rightfull owners.... all of us.
Rick & Jane Mission Coordinators
Disaster Outreach & Relief to Aceh & Nias
www.electriclamb.org