Map of Fiji

Map of Fiji

Saturday, February 27, 2016

SEA MERCY UPDATE: 26th February 2016 from Susan Skeggs

Today Sea Mercy again changed lives!  In conjunction with Rotary, the Red Cross, and representatives from the DO Lautoka,  Sea Mercy were the first outside support to reach Tikina Bureiwai in the Ra District.  They have 150 people in a cluster of 4-5 villages, including a primary and a pre-school.  Nearby is the Tikina Kavula and the Namarai Station that shelters 2 additional villages which were also supplied.   Bureiwai not only had a direct hit by Winston on Saturday but almost immediately also got hit by a 1 ½ m tidal surge through their village sweeping any of their salvageable belongings out to sea. Sea Mercy has been their only avenue of support and we supplied, food, clothing, medication and basic building supplies.  One of our volunteers said “Fijian’s are very resilient, but these people, children and babies were in desperate need of help and so grateful when we finally arrived today”. 

In another feel great story – last night the guests and crew of the Nai’a continued to do their amazing work – after working all they possibly could in the 6.5 hours of light left in the day they were on the island, the Nai’a team went to depart Makogai to rest and recover back to their
comfortable beds and life on board… until one of the guests realized that the kids (pretty much the whole village) had been sleeping exposed to the elements.  The Nai’a guests could not leave until they had built a shelter. They took apart one of the downed walls of the school, built a foundation, used nets and scraps to somehow built a roof. The 42 kids on Makogai last night had a sheltered place to sleep :)  As much as all my heart breaks over the destruction and sadness of TC Winston, my heart sings when I hear stories like these which renew my faith in humanity. 

Today we also had our vessels “Skabenger” and “Shine” arrive at Mokagai with additional supplies, medical supplies, our awesome Nurse Lauren Tapp and also the amazing “Shelter Boxes” We are still waiting on a full update, so will update you tomorrow. 

Our next mission assigned to us by Fiji National Disaster Management Office is Batiki Island.  This is another very badly affected island in the Lomaviti Group, this group of 4 villages have had basic medical support but have had very limited food and basic building supplies because of challenging accessibility.  We have provisions and a boat ready to go tomorrow.  We are also gathering supplies to load onto a vessel over the weekend heading to the Lau Group early next week.

Once again thank you very much for everyone who is helping our Sea Mercy mission in time and in cash donations.  Be proud that you are part of a team making a real difference to those out there in remote Fiji who have very few options out there to help them.

Vinaka vaka levu and, as always, if you would like to support our efforts with a cash donation, our bank account details are listed on the right.

Susan













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