Ready and Willing

For the sake of journaling I need to start at the beginning.

A massive, 7.0 earthquake hit Port au Prince Haiti on Tuesday Jan. 12, leaving the country completely devastated. I read that 80-90% of the buildings/houses are destroyed, leaving those who survived homeless, without food or water. I don't think they know how many have died, it's probably safe to say there will be many who will never be found under all the concrete. I read an article a few days ago that said there were over 1,500 bodies piled up outside the Port au Prince General Hospital and more being added every day. I cry when I watch the news stories, I would love to go and hold those little ones who have lost parents. I would love to comfort parents who have lost their children. My heart goes out to the country.

Aaron is a member of DMAT (disaster medical assistance team). It's a team set up by the federal government for this exact purpose. There are several teams located all over the country. who respond to the big disasters in the US. They have never been deployed outside of the country, until now. We have already deployed 3 DMAT teams to Haiti. 2 have set up field hospitals and another has been teamed up with the Coast Guard. Aaron has been put on alert with bags packed, passport, and stethoscope in hand for the next 6 weeks. He has his hand raised, "take me, I will go." This is the kind of stuff he dreams about.

The hospital also called him asking if he had a passport. The hospital was contacted by the government and placed "on call" with our transport teams. The plan is, when they get the signal, our teams will fly to Haiti pick up those in the field hospitals, load them onto big medical airplanes with all the equipment needed to keep them alive, and transport them to hospitals who can care for them. Aaron wasn't told which hospitals, I'm assuming some in Puerto Rico, Miami, and other big places who can handle them. Once again his hand is raised saying, "take me, I will go."

I hope he gets to go. It would be a chance of a life time. Although he really wants to do it over and over again. I was talking to a friend of mine and she said, "are you going to let him go?" Seriously??? Do you have to think about that?? A two week deployment is nothing when you look at the devastation in Haiti. There isn't much I can do for these people. I can't fly down and hold them, I don't have any money to send...so if Aaron gets a chance to go, I feel like we as a family are helping. Doing some good to people who need it.