Canadians recently returned from Vanuatu await for word on friends, colleagues

A Victoria family that just returned from Vanuatu is desperately hoping for word about the friends and colleagues they left behindafter a cyclone ripped apart the tiny South Pacific nation.

Dr. Jeff Unger, his wife Carla and their two daughters returned to Canada two weeks ago after spending seven months on the island of Tanna as part of the Victoria-Vanuatu Physician project, a grassroots development project that has sent doctors to the remote community for more than two decades.

“It’s absolutely devastating,” Unger told Yahoo Canada News.

“My wife and I, in the midst of trying to unpack and get life going again here, really are spending large parts of our day not only trying to connect with people but trying to figure out what we can do to help.”

Pictures from Vanuatu show scenes of utter devastation in the wake of Cyclone Pam, which tore through the South Pacific on the weekend. Homes have been flattened, trees uprooted and the countryside is littered with debris.

Major infrastructure like roads and bridges are damaged, some rendered unusable, and necessities like drinking water is in short supply.

Unger worked at the Lenakel Hospital on Tanna, a remote island with a population of about 35,000. It’s an island of mostly subsistence farmers that was already facing extreme poverty and limited education.

Patients would often walk four or five hours over dirt roads to reach the hospital for care, Unger said.

“Knowing the need ahead of time and now trying to imagine how cataclysmic this has really been for their crops. Although there’s not many reports from Tanna yet, the couple of flyovers that have been done have suggested that any building that is not concrete has been destroyed and even the concrete buildings, most of the tin roofs have been ripped off,” he said.

“So, I’m certain that there’s no access to clean water, the sanitation systems aren’t effective now, there’s no power. So, this is a true disaster for the people on the island of Tanna.”

Carla Unger said the couple had spoken to the family of one friend with access to a satellite phone and are hoping for more information in the coming days.

Unger was up into the early morning hours, helping organize a campaign to have the Canadian military’s Disaster Assistance Response Team sent to Tanna. Unger said most work will be concentrated in the capital of Port Vila.

“They’re set up, ready to go,” he said. “They specialize in sanitation, engineering, infrastructure and primary medical care.

“They would be a perfect fit to go to Tanna, which likely won’t get a lot of resources immediately.”

Vanuatuan President Baldwin Lonsdale appealed for immediate help, saying everything in the nation of 83 islands, about 1,000 miles east of Australia, will need to be rebuilt.

“I term it a monster that has hit Vanuatu,” Lonsdale said at a United Nations conference in Japan on Monday. “It is a setback for the government and for the people of Vanuatu… All the development that has taken place has been wiped out.”

Vanuatu is a nation of about 260,000. It is considered by the World Bank one of the world’s poorest nations, with an annual GDP of US$828 million. Canada’s GDP, for comparison, is US$1.8 trillion.

The Canadian Red Cross has set up a Cyclone Pam relief fund and Unger urged Canadians to give.

The Victoria-Vanuatu Physician Project will be doing long-term fundraising to repair the hospital and infrastructure on Tanna.

It’s unfathomable to think of the devastation the cyclone has wreaked, the Ungers said.

“It is a nation that was so poor and struggling so much, that this sets them back that they’re really starting from scratch,” Carla said.

“The people there, with so little they seem to have so much. They are among the friendliest, warmest, happiest people you could hope to meet,” Jeff added.