Category Archives: India

by nickharrop | October 25, 2012 · 9:30 am

Fifty years of responding to emergencies: the Boxing Day tsunami, 2004

In his fourth blog about how we’ve responded to emergencies over the last 50 years, Mike Noyes remembers the tsunami that hit on Boxing Day, 2004.

On Boxing Day 2004, an earthquake off the coast of Indonesia unleashed a tsunami that ripped through villages in Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India and Thailand. More than 230,000 people were killed, and millions of people from Sumatra to Somalia lost their homes, possessions and means of making a living.

Many of my colleagues have vivid memories of CAFOD’s response to the Boxing Day tsunami: the team saw what was happening on the news, and cut short their holidays to rush back into the office. Continue reading →

1 Comment

Filed under CAFOD, India, Indonesia, Sri Lanka

Tagged as CAFOD, cafod50, emergencies, indonesia, MikeN, mikenoyes, sri lanka, tsunami

by lstorr | December 22, 2009 · 4:24 pm

Tsunami: Five years on photogallery

Five years on from the Asian tsunami, people in Sri Lanka, Indonesia and India have safer, more comfortable homes, secure jobs and are better prepared for disasters.

Please light a candle in remembrance of those who died in the tsunami, and support our vital emergency work

You can play a crucial role in saving lives across the world whenever and wherever disaster strikes – by pledging regular financial support to our Emergency Response Team (ERT)

G20: Do not ignore those suffering

Bob Geldof at the G20, courtesy http://g20voice.org

Did you see the thickness of the doors on President Obama’s limo? Even the driver was opening and closing them like a vault at Fort Knox.

It seems incongruous to think of the “Beast” driving through the grey streets of London’s wharfland, carrying something so new age, so socio-politically now – an African-American president.

Old Father Thames has seen a lot of things, but he probably never expected this.

Continue reading →

Poznan: Our future generation

caritas I hope one day to have a daughter. And when she is growing up and has her own family she may well ask me why the world sat back and let climate change spiral out of control.

She may well ask why, when the world’s most notable scientists could agree that humankind had to act urgently and radically to prevent the worst impacts of climate change, the world’s politicians could not unite in action.

Continue reading →

India: Childhood changed in a day

“My parents are still in the village which is marooned by water and I have the responsibility of looking after my brother and sister”, six-year-old Munna tells me, who is sheltering in a camp in Madherpura.

At least 2.5 million people across seven districts were forced from their homes, in the northern Indian state of Bihar after monsoon rains caused a river to burst its banks.

Munna tells me that his parents are still living inside the village as they don’t want to leave their house for fear of losing whatever they could save from the flood.

“I have to provide food and protect them from any further danger”, he explains as his five-year-old sister Shilu busily eats some biscuits that Munna has collected from the relief camp. His youngest brother Bhola, 3, just sleeps.

Continue reading →

1 Comment

Filed under CAFOD, India

Tagged as emergencies, stalinS