By Miyako Hamasaka | PR Manager
In normal life, we are having toilets and showers in our homes and we do not recognize their importance in our lives unless we lose them. In fact, we think about that importance only when we have to replace a fitting or properly facing lack of water which might be occurs only a few times per year.
However, in a disaster or emergency situation, refugees resorting in camps are unfortunately forced to share necessities including toilets and showers. Humanitarian organizations such as JEN are responsible for ensuring that refugees have access to these facilities, which can sometimes be difficult to manage when there are over 84,000 refugees in one location, such as the case in Zaa’tari refugee camp. JEN puts its utmost efforts into making sure that all public toilets within its responsible areas in the camp are accessible, clean, and safe to use.
Regrettably, there is a small minority with a narrow perspective who continuously vandalize public toilets on purpose. In these unrespectable cases, refugees who will be most affected are the refugees who are most vulnerable.
JEN works to repair these public toilets on a continuous basis and in some circumstances completely rebuilds toilets that have had all their parts vandalized. JEN maintains these public toilets because access to safe and clean toilets is essential to protect the health of the refugees and prevent the spread of communicable diseases.
In the other hand of rehabilitation, sometimes there is a need of establishing a new facility to accommodate the continuous influx of refugees into the Zaa’tari camp where they set up homes in a location without operational public facilities. Recently, JEN completed a construction of a new public toilet in one of these newly occupied areas. With this facility, more than 300 refugees will be able to access a WASH facility near their home and make their life easier.
We believe these achievements will ensure a better life for refugees in the camp, and JEN will continue to support them with the best efforts.
Snow Storm Huda in Za’atari Camp
Early in January 2015 forecasters predicted a snow storm. It looked serious enough to name so they called it Huda. Less snow was expected in Amman than in 2013, but the government declared a public holiday the day before anyway.
JEN holds the responsibility for storm-dewatering in the camp. This means that when it rains we call in trucks with large tanks and hoses and vacuum pumps and suck up the water. So while many of the staff delighted at the unexpected holiday those who live closest to camp as well as the JEN maintenance team members gathered to go over the emergency plan for responding to the storm. They divided in to two shifts of 5 people each, so that we could maintain operations over night if needed. We reviewed the maps of where water accumulated last time. We established how we would communicate during the operations.
The morning of the storm brought a lot of strong wind. The emergency team spent most of the day tying down water tanks that we had thought were too heavy to blow away, we had been wrong the wind was strong enough to take them. The protective tarp and part of the roof blew off of one of the caravan that we work from. Around mid-day the rain started. Light initially, but growing increasingly heavy. The emergency team leader, Rami, called in the de-watering trucks. Three at first, then three more, then a few hours later he called four more.
Temperatures fell, the rain turned to snow. The second shift had to join the first because there was too much for them to handle alone. My phone rang and buzzed non-stop with urgent requests for a truck to help. Even some of the caravans were taking on water. Streets were flooded so that emergency vehicles couldn’t get through. The storm water flowed into septic tanks causing them to overflow. One of the schools was flooded endangering their supply of text books. Tents were collapsing under the weight of the snow. We arranged to have 12 trucks the next day.
When the sun came up the next day the water and 10-12 cm of heavy snow covered the ground. The trucks removed water as quickly as they could but the snow started melting faster than the trucks could work. More rain and snow fell. Other organizations brought in special trucks to clear out the septic tanks. Again the JEN team worked late into the night to stabilize the water levels.
The third day was also exceedingly long and cold. Another organization brought in additional trucks to support with de-watering. The JEN team persevered and by the time the left late at night they felt that they had made significant improvements – about 60% of the water had been removed and pumped outside the camp. That night temperatures dropped well below freezing. All the roads in the country were closed because they were covered in ice.
As the sun rose on the 4th morning the calls started again and our exhausted JEN team bundled up and went back out to keep working. Throughout the day the situation came more and more under control. We were able to reduce the number of trucks working and reduced the response to daylight hours. Nevertheless, it wasn’t until almost a week later that all water was removed and the normal routines in the camp could return to normal.
After all was said and done, Huda caused a lot more trouble in the north of Jordan than in Amman. People who had lived in the area their entire life said they had never seen anything like it. JEN’s emergency team rose to the challenge; braving extreme cold, and really wet conditions.
By Miyako Hamasaka | PR Manager
By Miyako Hamasaka | PR Manager
Project reports on GlobalGiving are posted directly to globalgiving.org by Project Leaders as they are completed, generally every 3-4 months. To protect the integrity of these documents, GlobalGiving does not alter them; therefore you may find some language or formatting issues.
If you donate to this project or have donated to this project, you can receive an email when this project posts a report. You can also subscribe for reports without donating.
