Disaster Response Teams

One of the most severe earthquakes of the past hundred years with a magnitude of 8.8 hit the Chilean city Concepción on 27 February, 2010. Around 500 people lost their lives and more than 500,000 homes were destroyed.

The DHL Disaster Response Team (DRT) with six team members started an operation to help the Chilean Emergency Agency ONEMI to transport relief goods on 5 March, 2010. At Santiago de Chile Airport the DRT organized the packaging of around 4,000 DHL speedballs containing more than 80 tonnes of relief aid such as food, water, and blankets. They were supported by 65 volunteers of the DHL Chile country office.

After handing over this operation to the authorities at the airport, the DRT relocated to Concepción on 9 March, 2010 and assisted the local authorities in the distribution of food and water supplies on invitation of ONEMI. This mission focused on streamlining the retail and distribution systems on the ground. 80 volunteers from DHL Chile transported the donated goods from Santiago to the disaster area on 40 DHL trucks. The trucks moved approximately 25 tons of material and household items for the humanitarian aid organization Hogar de Cristo.

A 7.0-magnitude earthquake hit Haiti, on Tuesday 12 January 2010. The capital Port-au-Prince, was heavily affected. The DHL DRT Americas, based in Panama, touched down and started operating out of Toussaint L'ouverture International Airport in Port-au-Prince within 48 hours. Our DRT with 8 DHL volunteers was the first logistics team at the airport. With so many shortages, security and logistical challenges, the DRT's skills at managing aid were sorely needed. More than 500 tonnes of relief goods were handled and temporarily stored by the DRT within the first week.

One week after the earthquake we moved our main DRT operations from Haiti to the Las Americas International Airport in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. Until the end of January 2010, a team of 5 DHL volunteers continued to unload humanitarian aid flights bringing drinking water, medical supplies and other aid, in close cooperation with the United Nations. In particular, the team managed a 3,000 square meter warehouse used to store and sort incoming aid on behalf of non-goverment organizations (NGOs). Thereafter, the DHL DRT team made ist way back to Port-au-Prince, to assist different NGOs on an ad hoc basis until Saturday 6 February 2010.

A 7.6-magnitude earthquake struck the island of Sumatra, Indonesia, on Wednesday September 30, 2009. Around 1,000 people lost their lives. The city of Padang was badly damaged. The Indonesian Government issued an appeal for international help. It was well aware of Deutsche Post DHL's disaster management activities as the GARD - Get Airports Ready for Disaster - program pilot was completed in Indonesia in June 2009.

The DRT was activated following a request from UNOCHA. Chris Weeks, DHL Director for Humanitarian Affairs and DRT Asia Pacific employee volunteers from Indonesia, Singapore, and from the DRT Middle East were deployed. They supported the handling of relief goods at Padang Airport for three weeks.

Typhoon Ketsana (Ondoy) hit the Philippines on September 26, 2009 causing widespread flooding. The Disaster Response Team (DRT) Asia Pacific was deployed on October 2. The homes of nearly 1.9 million people in Manila and surrounding areas were inundated by the flood waters. Hundreds of thousands of filipinos have been displaced from their homes.

Thanks to the support of the DRT, relief supplies were able to quickly reach those in need in the Philippines. During the DRT's 3-week long deployment, 21 volunteers provided logistical support at Manila Airport in three rotations. Already in 2007, DHL signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Philippine Government agreeing on DRT deployment procedures in an emergency situation.

On September 29, 2009 the South Pacific island of Samoa was hit by an 8.0-magnitude earthquake - the worst in 90 years. The earthquake caused waves of up to 7.5 meters which pounded villages and tourist resorts, killing around 150 people. Two DRT members arrived to provide logistics advice to local relief organisations. They concluded their mission on October 12, 2009. The Prime Minister of Samoa welcomed the team's support and expressed an interest in signing a permanent Memorandum of Understanding.

A series of powerful hurricanes swept through the Caribbean during September and October 2008. DRTs were requested to assess the need for logistics support in Honduras and the Turks and Caicos Islands in the aftermath. We helped local relief agencies to set up two warehouses and provided logistics advice to local personnel there and in Honduras.

Severe flooding in Panama in November 2008 affected tens of thousands of people, many of whom had to find temporary shelter in emergency camps.  Drinking water and blankets were urgently needed. At the UN's request, the Disaster Response Team Americas took over warehousing and inventory management at the David Airport in Chiriqui Province.

Cyclone Nargis affected 2.4 million people in the Irrawaddy Delta region of Myanmar in May 2008. The international humanitarian response faced significant challenges.

Thanks to our track record with the UN, the DHL Disaster Response Team was able to take part in this effort of coordinating 17 humanitarian organizations and UN agencies, readying 2,200 tons of aid for the relief agencies to take to communities in the Delta region.

The southern region of Peru was struck by a violent earthquake in mid-August 2007. Within three days, the DHL Disaster Response Team Americas was in action at Pisco Air Base.

With the support of DHL Peru employees and local help, the DHL team coordinated the warehousing and distribution of large quantities of supplies sent to Peru by national and international aid organizations, governments, churches, NGOs and private donors. The Disaster Response Team stayed in Pisco for two weeks, during which time the team had trained members of the Peruvian civil defense (INDECI) to manage the warehouse and inventory on their own.

More than 6,200 people died, 30,000 were injured, and nearly 650,000 were left homeless after an earthquake struck the Indonesian island of Java in late May 2006.

At the request of the Indonesian coordination agency for emergency aid (Bakornas) and the UN-Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), the DHL Disaster Response Team Asia Pacific was mobilized at the Solo Adisoemarmo Airport on Java. Within a short period of time, 200 tons of supplies were transferred from 6,500 shipments containing primarily medicine, tents, blankets and food. The 14-member DHL team also trained workers to ensure supplies would continue being distributed after the team had left.

For weeks in the late summer of 2005, Hurricane Katrina made headlines for the havoc it had wreaked on the Gulf Coast. For a period of two weeks, the DHL Disaster Response Team was set up at the Little Rock (Arkansas) Air Force Base to supervise the distribution of 2,370 tons of international humanitarian aid from 18 countries in the disaster area.

Deutsche Post DHL contributed a total value of US$1 million these relief efforts. Services to transport emergency aid and for rebuilding the disaster area totaled around US$ 500,000. The company and its staff also made in-kind and cash donations.

When a violent quake struck Pakistan and Northern India in October 2005, the extent of the disaster was not immediately apparent. Many of the roughly 50,000 victims were living in remote mountain valleys without easy access. Millions of people were left homeless. During the chaos of the initial relief efforts, UNO Emergency Relief Coordinator, Jan Egeland, called the situation a "logistical nightmare" of a dimension the UN had never seen.

DHL leveraged its logistics experience to ensure that international aid arriving on chartered flights could be transferred as quickly and efficiently as possible to keep Islamabad Airport open for further shipments.

Within hours after the catastrophic flooding of coastal areas of the Indian Ocean in 2004, Deutsche Post DHL began organizing the logistics and transportation of humanitarian aid by leveraging its worldwide network. On the Thai island of Phuket, DHL vehicles shuttled tourists to safe places and in India they helped transport federal police forces to the disaster area. The Airport Emergency Team--the predecessor of today's Disaster Response Teams--was mobilized and sent to Colombo Airport on the island of Sri Lanka.

In the weeks that followed, Deutsche Post DHL and staff members contributed even further to the relief efforts. The company donated EUR1 million in cash and provided free special cargo flights to the disaster area. Thousands of employees made donations out of their own pockets. A joint initiative by Deutsche Post DHL and eBay raised over  € 2 million.