Man rescued from rubble 14 days after Haiti quake

Rico Dibrivell, 35, is attended by a U.S. military rescue team after being freed from the rubble of a building in Port-au-Prince, January 26, 2010. REUTERS/Eduardo Munoz

PORT-AU-PRINCE, (Reuters) – U.S. troops pulled a man  alive from under a collapsed building in Haiti’s capital yesterday as U.N. troops sprayed tear gas at survivors desperate  for food two weeks after a catastrophic earthquake.

The 35-year-old man, covered in dust and dressed only in  underpants, was carried from the ruins of a building in  downtown Port-au-Prince on a stretcher and driven off for  medical treatment.

He was rescued by soldiers of the 82nd Airborne Division,  and did not appear to have any serious injuries.

More than 130 people have been pulled out still living from  under wrecked buildings by rescue teams from around the world,  although hopes of finding more survivors are fading fast.

The latest rescue, exactly 14 days after the magnitude-7.0  earthquake killed as many as 200,000 people, came as the  U.S.-led relief effort was focused on getting help to hundreds  of thousands of survivors left homeless, hungry and injured.

Brazilian U.N. peacekeeping troops sprayed tear gas at a  frenzied crowd of thousands crowding a food handout outside the  wrecked presidential palace earlier yesterday.

“They’re not violent, just desperate. They just want to  eat,” Brazilian Army Colonel Fernando Soares said. “The problem  is, there is not enough food for everyone.”

U.S. troops, U.N. peacekeepers and aid workers have widened  and intensified the distribution of food and water, but many  Haitians are still not receiving emergency aid.

Some of the food handouts in the capital have turned  unruly, although the United Nations said the overall security  situation in Port-au-Prince remained stable and that about  two-thirds of Haiti’s police force has returned to work.

Rico Dibrivell, 35, is attended by a U.S. military rescue team after being freed from the rubble of a building in Port-au-Prince, January 26, 2010. REUTERS/Eduardo Munoz

At the presidential palace yesterday, U.N. troops with  shotguns protected relief workers handing out sacks of rice  with American flags on them. Armored trucks formed a cordon to  control the crowd and people were searched as they entered the  checkpoint.

“Yesterday they gave us rice, but there was not enough.  There were too many people,” said Wola Levolise, 47, who is  living in the camp with her nine children.

The U.N. World Food Program said it handed out 60 tons of  food at the camp but ended the distribution early when the  crowd got out of control.

“There are isolated, regrettable incidents but these are  the exceptions and not the rule,” a WFP spokesman said.

The U.N. agency said it has delivered nearly 10 million  meals to almost 450,000 people since the quake.

Unsanitary living conditions in Port-au-Prince have raised  fears of an outbreak of disease.

So far, doctors on the U.S. Navy hospital ship Comfort,  anchored offshore, said they had one case each of typhoid and  tuberculosis and several of tetanus, malaria and dysentery.

Lewis Lucke, the retired U.S. ambassador coordinating the  relief effort, said aid was moving as fast as possible given  the chaotic conditions. “This is really a disaster of biblical  proportions,” he told Reuters.

JOBS PROGRAM

In a bid to get the economy going, the United Nations is  offering 150 gourdes ($3.77) a day plus food rations to those  willing to take jobs clearing rubble from roads and removing  waste that posed a potential health threat.

More than 5,500 Haitians had already started the two-week  jobs, using shovels, hammers, wheelbarrows and trucks to load  debris and haul it to landfills.

The U.S. military said it could scale back its involvement  within three to six months as other international organizations  assume larger roles providing security and disaster relief. It  does, however, plan to help build a 5,000-bed hospital to  provide longer-term care to quake victims.

The United States has dispatched more than 15,000 military  personnel to Haiti; about 4,700 are deployed on the ground.

There were signs the ruined capital was slowly returning to  life. A city garbage truck hauled away piles of rubbish at a  makeshift camp and a long line snaked outside a bank in the  suburb of Petionville. A street market along Rue Geffrard in  Port-au-Prince was crowded and chaotic.

The capital’s destroyed downtown commercial area, however,  had few open shops. Scavengers picked at smashed buildings for  planks of lumber, steel bars and other building materials.

The Haitian government says about 1 million Haitians  weredisplaced from their homes in the capital. It had tents for  400,000 to be used in temporary tent villages to be built  outside the city, but said 200,000 more would be needed.

Tents are especially important with the approach of the  rainy season, which begins in April.

The United Nations said the exodus of quake victims out of  the capital has slowed to a trickle, with less than 1,000  leaving over the past day. About 236,000 people have left for  the countryside but the United Nations said most had moved in  with relatives and large-scale shelter wouldn’t be needed.