At first the good news - at least the don't have to deal with nuclear fallout there, this is the only positive idea I got after collecting information about the situation on Aceh.
I know, I will get negative response to this posting - I will survive this.
Compared with the catastrophe on Aceh, the bomb of Nagasaki was nothing more than a big fart.
When you have seen the private video yesterday, when we know now, that the water wall was 20m high there, when you see the pictures taken from Helicopters and the Australian Royal Air Force, when you realise that towns with 40.000 - 400.000 inhabitants were blown away in seconds, then every human being with an IQ 10 points over the IQ of a chicken will realise that the official death toll for Indonesia of 80.000 people can only be
a lousy joke.
A territory of 20.000 km2 is literally erased there, it is almost a miracle that anybody survived this, there is no food, almost no water and medical help available for at least 1 mio people since 5 days.
Heavy equipment is rare and if it's available, then in many cases there is no fuel or Diesel for it.
The whole infrastructure is devastated, help supply cannot reach the places where it's needed, any co-ordination of the activities is not present at all.
While the Australian Air Force is sending Hercules transporters to Jakarta, Garruda still flies to Banda Aceh.
and to Medan, medical and humanitarian aid is arriving Medan and nobody has any idea how to get it from there into the crisis area.
They have sent medical teams to Banda Aceh from Jakarta, but they don't have anything to work with.
International care organisations have to start from zero there, no administration or any kind of organised help is present, they potential helpers are tied were they are many locations are still under water and the only way to get there is a helicopter.
This is a logistic challenge for the world community without any compare in the history, in some weeks we will see pictures from Aceh, like we had to see from Ethiopia 20 year ago, hunger, to their bones grown thin children,
a distress from biblical extent.
Not enough, that they have to deal with a devastation, only comparable with the impact of a nuclear bomb, with hundred thousands tons of rubble, garbage, hundred thousands of corpses from human beings and animals, all this happened also in a war zone, with envious rebels and corrupt military leaders.
This tragedy demands the help of the entire world, Indonesia does what it can, the Indonesian people donate what it can for their countrymen on Aceh, but Indonesia like most of the other countries of the world cannot cope with this.
My appeal to all of you, inform your neighbour, explain this to everybody you know, donate to the big organisations like Unicef, the Red Cross or others, only they are able to organise the help which is needed in this case ( usually, I don't consider the Red Cross as very effective, but this case is different).
Act now, don't hesitate, we can discuss what long term help should be launched later, don't quarrel what your government is doing or should do, take your own responsibility for this people is distress now!
I used drastic words here, I know - I hope and wish somebody will prove me wrong in some weeks or months,
I fear the body count for Indonesia will reach some several hundred thousands in the aftermath of this catastrophe - I will be happy when I was wrong, I will be happy when somebody proves I was exaggerating.
Regards
Thorsten