Responder's First Hand Report from Haiti-Unproven!

Responder's First Hand Report from Haiti-Unproven!

Summary of the eRumor:
This is a forwarded email with an account from Haiti by a rescue worker named Nick Brockhausen. After his return from the earthquake stricken Haiti he reported on what he called the incompetence of the United States Agency for International Development. The email also speaks negatively of the Obama Administration, The United Nations and the Haitian people.

The Truth:
Nick Brockhausen has not responded to our inquiries but this email may be a debrief or vent sent privately to friends or family members who forwarded it on to friends in their distribution list.

Brockhausen cited problems of what he regarded as incompetence of United States Agency for International Development (USAID) owing to lack of sanitation resources, security issues and language challenges.

The email began circulating in late January 2010, weeks after a devastating earthquake measuring over 7.0 on the Richter scale shook the Haitian capitol, Port Au Prince, for 35 seconds. Over 100,000 lives have been reported lost by the natural disaster. According to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the USAID is the lead "U.S. Government office responsible for providing humanitarian assistance in response to international emergencies and disasters."

Different versions of the email appeared on the internet, some blocking out the names, others saying the two responders returning from Haiti were doctors, dentists, ham radio operators or firemen.

TruthorFiction.com has confirmed that Brockhausen and the other person mentioned in the email, Dennis Hebler, are real and were part of the relief efforts in Haiti.

Hebler told TruthOrFiction.com that this was not his opinion and that he was "focused on the job at hand and didn't make any reference to anything else either good or bad." He went on to tell us "As far as I am concerned the situation down there was overwhelming and it would have been difficult for anyone to have functioned at a high level of competence."

According to their website, USAID is trained in the FEMA Incident Response System, a special series of special courses that all US law enforcement and emergency response agencies must learn. This is the same training that was used by the US Coast Guard in relief efforts in the aftermath from Hurricane Katrina. USAID also teaches the FEMA courseware to emergency responders internationally.

It is not known if Haitian responders had been trained in the FEMA course prior to the earthquake.

Updated 02/17/10

A real example of the eRumor as it has appeared on the Internet:

To All,

I just returned from Haiti with Hebler. We flew in at 3 AM Sunday to the scene of such incredible destruction on one side, and enormous ineptitude and criminal neglect on the other.

Port o Prince is in ruins. The rest of the country is fairly intact.Our team was a rescue team and we carried special equipment that locates people buried under the rubble. There are easily 200,000 dead, the city smells like a charnal house. The bloody UN was there for 5 years doing apparently nothing but wasting US Taxpayers money. The ones I ran into were either incompeyent or outright anti american. Most are French or french speakers, worthless every damn one of them. While 1800 rescuers were ready willing and able to leave the airport and go do our jobs, the UN and USAID ( another organization full of little OBamites and communisrts that openly speak against Amerivca) These two organizations exemplared their parochialism by:

USAID, when in control of all inbound flights, had food and water flights stacked up all the way to Miami , yet allowed Geraldo Rivera, Anderson Cooper and a host of other left wing news puppies to land..

Pulled all the security off the rescue teams so that Bill Clinton and his wife could have the grand tour, whilst we sat unable to get to people trapped in the rubble.

Stacked enough food and water for the relief over at the side of the airfield then put a guard on it while we dehydrated and wouldnt release a drop of it to the resuers.

& No shower facilities to decontaminate after digging or moving corpses all day, except for the FEMA teams hwo brought their own shower and decon equipment, as well as air conditioned tents.

No latrine facilities, less digging a hole if you set up a shitter everyone was trying to use it.

I watched a 25 year old Obamite with the USAID shrieking hysterically, berate a full bird colonel in the air force, because he countermanded her orders, whiulst trying to unscrew the air pattern. " You dont know what your president wants! The military isn't in charge here we are!"

If any of you are thinking of giving money to the Haitian relief, or to the UN dont waste your money. It will only go to further the goals of the French and the Liberal left.

If we are a fair and even society, why is it that only white couples are adopting Haitian orphans. Where the hell is that vocal minority that is alweays screaming about the injustice of American society.

Bad place, bad situation, but a perfect look at the new world order in action. New Orleans magnified a thousand times. Haiti doesnt need democracy, what Haiti needs is Papa Doc. Thats not just my opinion , that is what virtually every Haitian we talked with said. the French run the UN treat us the same as when we were a colony, at least Papa Doc ran the country.

Oh, and as a last slap in the face the last four of us had to take US AIRWAYs home from Phoenix . They slapped me with a 590 dollar baggage charge for the four of us. The girl at the counter was almost in tears because she couldnt give us a discount or she would lose her job. Pass that on to the flying public.

Nick

Version 2 :

The Situation in Haiti from an insider

To All,

I just returned from Haiti with Hxxxx. We flew in at 3 AM Sunday to the scene of such incredible destruction on one side, and enormous ineptitude and criminal neglect on the other.

Port au Prince is in ruins. The rest of the country is fairly intact. Our team was a rescue team and we carried special equipment that locates people buried under the rubble. There are easily 200,000 dead, the city smells like a charnel house. The bloody UN was there for 5 years doing apparently nothing but wasting US Taxpayers money. The ones I ran into were either incompetent or outright anti-American. Most are French or french speakers, worthless every damn one of them.

While 1800 rescuers were ready willing and able to leave the airport and go do our jobs, the UN and USAID ( another organization full of little OBamites and communists that openly speak against America) These two organizations exemplared their parochialism by:

USAID, when in control of all inbound flights, had food and water flights stacked up all the way to Miami, yet allowed Geraldo Rivera, Anderson Cooper and a host of other left wing news puppies to land.

Pulled all the security off the rescue teams so that Bill Clinton and his wife could have the grand tour, whilst we sat unable to get to people trapped in the rubble.

Stacked enough food and water for the relief over at the side of the airfield then put a guard on it while we dehydrated and wouldn't release a drop of it to the rescuers.

No shower facilities to decontaminate after digging or moving corpses all day, except for the FEMA teams who brought their own shower and decon equipment, as well as air conditioned tents.

No latrine facilities, less digging a hole. If you set up a latrine everyone was trying to use it.

I watched a 25 year old Obamite with the USAID shrieking hysterically, berate a full bird colonel in the air force, because he countermanded her orders, whilst trying to unscrew the air pattern. " You don't know what your president wants! The military isn't in charge here we are!"

If any of you are thinking of giving money to the Haitian relief, or to the UN don't waste your money. It will only go to further the goals of the French and the Liberal left.

If we are a fair and even society, why is it that only white couples are adopting Haitian orphans. Where the hell is that vocal minority that is always screaming about the injustice of American society.

Bad place, bad situation, but a perfect look at the new world order in action. New Orleans magnified a thousand times. Haiti doesnt need democracy. What Haiti needs is Papa Doc. That's not just my opinion. That is what virtually every Haitian we talked with said. The French run UN treat us the same as when we were a colony, at least Papa Doc ran the country.

Oh, and as a last slap in the face the last four of us had to take US AIRWAYS home from Phoenix. They slapped me with a $590 dollar baggage charge for the four of us. The girl at the counter was almost in tears because she couldn't give us a discount or she would lose her job. Pass that on to the flying public.