Starfish Community

Mission Aviation Fellowship has aircraft ready to depart to Haiti. They are attempting to gain a better understanding of the status of the Port-Au-Prince Airport. Specifically, they need to know about the airport's current capabilities for night operations - does the airport have functional lights for night landings?

Does the community have any information regarding the airport?

Currently we know:

*The control tower has collapsed.

*The airport terminal has suffered structural damage

*The runway appears to be stable

*UN peacekeeping chief Alain Le Roy says Port-au-Prince airport is "operational" and aid will start flowing soon

Any additional information from organizations on the ground in Haiti would be invaluable..

I just talked to the pilot from MAF that will be flying to Port-Au-Prince.

He would like to know about the availability of fuel at Port-Au-Prince Airport.

If fuel is available at the airport, they won't have to carry as much fuel on the flight down and will therefore be able to carry more relief supplies

He would like to know the availability of:

• Avgas -100 octane low lead

• Jet Fuel

Thanks for the help

Per CNN Report: 1/13/09 at 11:50AM Central

The U.S. State Department has been told to expect "serious loss of life," spokesman P.J. Crowley said.

The main airport in Haiti appears to be operable. U.S. Embassy staff at the airport said the tower and the lights are working, Crowley said Wednesday.

Based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Have low financial resources, but the time to engage in Haiti relief efforts. ashaemm1002@hotmail.com

Dear all, I cannot confirm that the tower has collapsed. MAF is NOT flying from the US to Port Au Prince. We are using Missionary Flights International (MFI) based out of Ft. Pierce Florida. Disaster Response Manager, John Woodberry will be arriving tomorrow 1/14 in PAP via MFI flight. He will be joined by regional manager Rick Dickson. We still do not have confirmation that our aircraft are in good shape. American Airlines is still saying no flights from US at this point, and there appears to only be one smaller airstrip available.
MAF has seven families on the ground PAP and all are ok, we still do not have complete confirmation that our national staff are ok. Once we secure our staff, we will likely begin working with helping the humanitarian response which at this point is huge. Still looking for any good information if you have it - our cell phones are still inop. Ron Wismer, MAF

MFI confirmed that their aircraft took off en route to Haiti 2 hours ago... they said they would provide us any information regarding the airport upon their arrival.

I have contacts at Hope 4 Haiti and Americares. They have acquired one airliner in Miami to transport goods as soon as they can get approval and airport access in Haiti.

If MFI or MAF has the ability to transport medical supplies or larger water purification units (from Charleston), please let me know. We have the supplies but need insight about the logistics of transportation.

As a philanthropy advisor to major donors, I also have access to an organization with 10,000 excess blankets on the Texas coast that could be packed up and transported if we knew of a trustworthy means of transportation. Please let me know if you know of one.

MAF does not have capability for flying from the US at this point. We are hoping that MFI will be doing the flying from the US. If that becomes overwhelming we may need to look at charter operators with larger equipment. Water and Food security will be an issue very soon. I hope to have a sit rep by tomorrow evening from John Woodberry.

Mr Wismer,

Would you mind posting that sit rep here if a create a new post for it? I think it would prove very beneficial for the community.

VR

Dave Bopp

We have confirmation that Samaritan's Purse landed a relief plane at 5 pm today, and one hour later Food for the Poor could not get landing clearance. Clearly an unstable situation at present, but some planes are getting in. Per Paul's earlier post, we would appreciate options for transporting mobile water purification units from Charleston, SC, but can also arrange air transport from Miami as we can use our FedEx partnership to get systems from Charleston, SC to Miami.