Haiti - earthquake search and rescue

Aid, rescue teams trickle in as survivors mass in centre

Article published on the 2010-01-14 Latest update 2010-01-14 11:52 TU

A US Southern Command assessment team boards a C-130 Hercules aircraft Wednesday in Miami, Florida
(Photo: Reuters)

Planeloads of rescuers and relief supplies have been dispatched to Haiti following Tuesday's 7.0 earthquake, which has turned the centre of the capital into an open-air refugee camp lacking water, food or medicine.

The United States has launched a military and civilian operation to help the impoverished Caribbean nation, with some estimates putting the death toll at up to 100,000 people.

Much of the capital, Port-au-Prince, has been reduced to rubble, but the airport remains operational, opening the way for international relief aid to be ferried in by air as well as sea.

While the full extent of the devastation remained unclear, Obama said the US Defence and State Departments along with the US Agency for International Development would lead relief efforts.

Forward teams of civilian and military experts have begun landing in Haiti as US aircraft searched for survivors and tried to assess the damage, with some 5,000 troops on stand-by.

The USS Carl Vinson aircraft carrier was en route and set to arrive Thursday, while destroyers and more Coast Guard ships were on the way, said General Douglas Fraser, head of the US Southern Command.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton abruptly cut short her planned trip to Asia, flying back from Hawaii. Defence Secretary Robert Gates also cancelled plans for a trip to Australia to " continue to manage the department's response” to the humanitarian crisis.

Former US president Bill Clinton, now the special envoy for the United Nations in Haiti, launched an emergency fund, with the UN releasing 10 million US dollars in aid. The global body itself lost staff and buildings in the quake.