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The world's focus on Global Warming with its unpredictable future is happening while the world is trying to recuperate from the catastrophic central Asian Earthquake as well as the Asian Tsunami, which also happened on the anniversary of the great Bam earthquake in Iran. Tens of thousands have lost their lives - most communities wiped out in a matter of minutes or hours. The hurricanes on the South Coast of the United States have created an unprecedented disaster requiring great cost and effort to deal with. Added to this are the Central American hurricanes, refugees in Darfur, as well as continuous victims of AIDS who leave behind huge numbers of homeless orphans.
Emergency help has been rushing and criss-crossing the globe to find survivors - doctoring, feeding, crowding them into temporary shelters and relocating them. There are not enough tents in the world to shelter the latest Central Asian earthquake victims who are facing more disaster from the winter freeze and winds.
The greatest costs of rebuilding after the disasters goes to the infrastructure and human shelter.
The need is ever more urgent to build self-help, emergency shelters which can become sustainable, permanent structures and are more resistant to more disasters.
The accelerating rate of disasters in the world and the historical increase in the loss of human life and property, must create a sense of urgency for the U.N. and other agencies to pay serious attention to alternative ways of building.
There is a Sustainable Solution to Human Shelter, based on Timeless Materials (earth, water, air and fire) and Timeless Principles (arches, vaults and domes). Every man and woman should be able to build a shelter for his or her family with these universal elements, almost anywhere on the earth and other planets. These principles, interpreted into the simplest form of building technology have created emergency shelter which can become permanent houses, and which have passed strict tests and building codes. Since 1975 we have been dedicated to researching and developing this low-cost, self-help, eco-friendly technology which can resist disasters, and to offer it to humanity. The only missing link is to educate humans how to use these timeless techniques, developed at Cal-Earth Institute, to fit their own culture and environment.
PRESS RELEASE
Self-Help Emergency Shelter for Central Asian Earthquake Disaster
Cal-Earth Institute is ready to offer its help to Families, International, Governmental and Non-governmental organizations in the earthquake disaster region for emergency shelters.
Basic materials needed are on-site earth, sandbags, barbed wire, and human labor.
To the best of it's ability as a small institute it will contribute its technology using the following methods:
1) Provide Distance Learning via live internet connection instructing how to construct the emergency shelters directly to relief organizations in the disaster area.
2) Provide training at Cal-Earth Institute to selected individuals in intensive hands-on workshops who are coming from the disaster regions to teach and supervise the construction of shelters. The training is based on Cal-Earth’s existing educational materials.
This emergency shelter technology can be used for the reconstruction of both permanent housing as well as other buildings and infrastructures.
Cal-Earth Institute is a non-profit educational and research organization in Hesperia, California. The Superadobe emergency shelter technology, which has been designed and developed by architect Nader Khalili and his associates at Cal-Earth Institute, has been built and successfully tested for California’s strict building codes. It is patented in the U.S. and overseas but is now offered freely to those in need in the disaster region.
The shelters and technology have been visited and endorsed by the United Nations emergency response in 2001, and recently given the 2004 Aga Khan award for architecture for Sandbag Shelters - see link for description, photos and video clip.
PRESS RESPONSE
Reuters Alertnet: "War zones yield cheap shelter for tsunami homeless" (sandbags and barbed wire)
- from Reuters Alertnet:
" My goal is to use distance learning through the Internet," he said. "If we could set up a regional center, we can broadcast building classes direct from Cal-Earth,"
" We can cut through the bureaucracy and go directly to the people ... We could do it with a fraction of the foreign aid that has been offered to Bam. "
- from the Washington Post:
" Bypass the U.N., bypass government, people can start building their own. "
Dear friends,
We have been overwhelmed by your calls, emails and proposals and were very happy to see such devotion and concerns surfacing among Pakistanis. We apologize for not responding. It has become impossible for us to attend the avalanche of emails and calls not only from Pakistanis but other disasters.
Cal-Earth is a small non profit organization with great ideas and dreams and meager means. Architect Nader Khalili has given his full attention to the mission of shelter for the needy and disaster stricken since 1975. He set up Cal-Earth Institute in 1991 specifically for Superadobe, sandbag and barbed wire technology that he had designed to be the most accessible for humans around globe. This system uses on-site damp earth for temporary structures, and stabilized earth with a small amount of cement/lime for long term structures along with needed doors and windows, provided the necessary buttressing and waterproofing are added. The rest of the story is on our website, in the News Articles' section.
Our not responding has been because we have been intensely working to help deal with these disasters especially with the emergency shelter for the great earthquake victims in Pakistan. And we are happy to share the following news with you:
1. A hands-on teaching site has now been set up by the SASI foundation in cooperation with the government in Rawalpindi and prototypes are being built which can be suitable to the local earthquake sites' soil and conditions. Two of our trained apprentices are teaching and helping on location. We encourage you to collaborate, participate, learn, volunteer, and support. They are making the Superadobe bags available, while they are trying to set up several teaching centers in different regions.
2. To respond to this great disaster when victims are threatened every day for their lives because of fast approaching winter, as well as other disasters around the globe, we are focusing on giving more information about the Emergency Shelter with the Superadobe building method. We are diligently working to finish a summary of the relative section of Mr. Khalili's unpublished, soon to be finished, manuscript, the Superadobe Manual, to be placed on the Emergency Shelter page of Cal-Earth's website.
3. We are hoping to find volunteer staff to respond to the avalanche of correspondence while we are planning to do Distance Learning sessions to speed up the training, when funding becomes available. However, we have accomplished a lot with little so far and are confident that we will sustain.
We believe that your networking together can create a critical mass, to help the disaster stricken people and support the continuation of design and teaching, including Distance Learning, of this sustainable solution for Pakistan and other regions, now and in the future.
Iliona Outram
program director
Cal-Earth Institute
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