Newspaper Story

2 IRSC students in Haiti helping with relief, language barrier

By Tyler Treadway (www.tcpalm.com)
Posted January 22, 2010 at 4:10 p.m.

FORT PIERCE — Two Indian River State College students trained in the school’s emergency management program and fluent in Haitian patois are working with earthquake relief agencies in Port-au-Prince.

Cleauberdy Brenovil, 27, of Jensen Beach, and Jean Estiva Charles, 43, of Fort Pierce, left for Haiti on Wednesday under the auspices of the Eagles Wings Foundation, a West Palm Beach-based disaster relief group that works closely with the Red Cross and other organizations.

Brenovil and Charles, both enrolled in the IRSC bachelor’s degree program in public safety administration, are helping distribute food and water at a logistics center in Port-au-Prince and acting as translators at meetings with multi-nationals to plan and coordinate operations by government agencies, the United Nations and nonprofit aid organizations.

Paul Forage, an IRSC associate professor who coordinates the college’s emergency management program, said Brenovil and Charles are expected to be in Haiti between two weeks and 30 days.

Forage said communication with Brenovil and Charles is “spotty” despite a suitcase-size satellite communications unit they have that was bought with a grant from the U.S. Department of Justice.

“I talked to (Charles on Friday),” Forage said, “and he said the situation on the ground is really tough. There’s a huge need to deliver food and water to the places where people really need it. They get 2 or 3 tons of supplies to a distribution center, and it runs out really quickly because the need is so great.”

Forage said supplies are arriving at the Port-au-Prince airport, “but there are log jams that keep it from getting out to the people. It’s always difficult to coordinate distribution in the first week after a disaster, even one here in the (United States). That’s part of the job (Brenovil and Charles) are working on, and it’s something their training has prepared them for.”

Brenovil and Charles participated in the college’s Summer Institute for Disaster Relief and Humanitarian Assistance, a two-week program in Macedonia with scenario-based training in earthquake response that tests students’ abilities to cope with limited resources, language barriers and civil military relations.

What the training can’t prepare them for, Forage added, “is the emotional reaction to the suffering they’re witnessing; nothing can prepare you for that.”

Forage said both Brenovil and Charles have family in Haiti, and “they’ve both lost a few relatives.”