Haiti earthquake response

Wed, 10 Feb 2010

UNOSAT involvement in Haiti earthquake response

UNOSAT Senior expert arrived yesterday in Port-au-Prince in order to organize the collection of ground data that will allow UNOSAT to refine the results of its damage assessment done at the request of UNDP Regional Office. Coordination is on-going with the EC Joint Research Center and the World Bank to define joint products in support of the Post Disaster Needs Assessment (PDNA).
Next week a second UNOSAT expert will be deployed as part of the PDNA. The aim is to provide the PDNA team with geo-information support. Damage to community infrastructure will be particularly assessed. This work will be done jointly with the EC Joint Research Center and in cooperation with the Centre National de l'Information Geo-Spatiale (CNIGS) which is the Haitian Institution for Geo-information. UNOSAT is committed to support CNIGS, which has suffered from human and material loss following the earthquake. This support will further enhance CNIGS' capacity to tackle the challenges they are facing, such as support to relief operations, vulnerability mapping in view of the up-coming hurricane season, damage assessment that will contribute to the definition of reconstruction plan, support to the implementation and monitoring of reconstruction.
More info on the PDNA: http://oneresponse.info/Disasters/Haiti/Early%20Recovery/Pages/default.aspx.
UNOSAT Haiti maps: http://www.unosat.org/asp/prod_free.asp?id=52.