Latest News

29/08/2010 Pakistan Update

We have shipped ~500 Aquaboxes and 15 AquaFilter "Communities."  These fifteen "Community" units are eqivalent to at least 150 Aqua30's that they replace and have a capacity of producing at least 3.5 million litres of potable water.

Now that August is nearly over, we hope that we can turn around the restocking so we can ship the next container shipment within  a couple of weeks or so.  We have 200 presently in stock and 100 returns promised within a week.

Your support has now exceeeded £100k within August; under four weeks from teh onset of the disaster.  Fantastic. So we will be looking to ship over a 1000 Aquaboxes as soon as they are returned and/or we can pack Aquabox Golds to make up the numbers.  With our British Summer vacations largely over, hopefully our next 500 Aquaboxes target will be quickly reached. (We will have 300 of the 500 target available already in sight).

29/08/2010 Open Day a Success

The Open Day was a success with many visitors and supporters calling in; some from afar.  Thanks you all for making it such a success..

Maybe we can repeat the excercise with another Open Day as part of the Wirksworth Festival Trails in mid September?  Watch this space.

22/08/2010 AQUABOX Cromford Depot Open Day:- Saturday 25th August

Our Depot will be open on Saturday 28th August from 0930 hours.  We are anticipating visits from the Chairman of the Derbyshire County Council and our Local Rt. Hon. Patrick McLoughlin.

All are very welcome.

Our Canadian Partners (Stratford Ontario) have asked us to supply Aquaboxes on their behalf

Our colleagues in Stratford Ontario, who run the Canadian Aquabox scheme, have asked that we ship Aquaboxes out to Pakistan on their behalf.

We have said that we would be more than pleased to do so.  We expect to ship ~80 Aquabox Gold's on their behalf.  We will be making a photo call.

22/08/2010 Pakistan Shipments

We will have shipped 500 Standard Aquaboxes and the equivalent of 24 Aqua 30's by the end of this month.  These have a nominal value before shipping of ~£50,000.

Your support to date has matched this figure and we will continue to ship in line with your wihes as shown by the level of donations  we recieve. With the annual vacation season nearly over, we hope that our capacity to generate our Aquaboxes and AquaFilters and will enable us to 100% match your kind donations. 

It is our intention to ship out Aquaboxes to the many thousands of Pakistani victims of the floods as long as you continue to donate aid for them.  

22/08/2010 Pakistan Update

We were awaiting confirmation of our partner’s consignee but it failed to materialise. So we have agreed an alternative route.

 In the meantime, we had lost our place in the air freight queue and we now have a firm booking for August 31st.

We will be shipping 200 Standards Aquaboxes, 10 Aqua30's and 14 or more AquaFilter "Communities" through " Humanity First" and the NCHD (National Commission for Human Development).

11/08/2010 How to Order AquaFilters for Pakistan

We are scheduling the shipment of eleven AquaFilter Community units and ten Aqua30's to Pakistan.

If you would like to specifically donate an AquaFilter Community, please use the standard Aqua30 order form ("Support Aquabox") and overwrite it as an AquaFilter Community.  The nominal cost is the same at £250.

We anticipate sending at least five more within the next ten days. 

06/08/2010 Pakistan; Call for the return of Aquaboxes

As you probaly know, we are short of Aquaboxes to send to Pakistan. 

If you have Aquaboxes to be filled or already filled but not returned, can you please look to returning them to Cromford Depot as soon as possible.

Thanks on behalf of the victims of the Pakistan flooding.

04/08/2010 Pakistan and Aquaboxes; Your Help is Needed Urgently

Having secured routes into Pakistan for our remaining stocks, it is obvious that this disaster is a major catastrophe and will takes many months and probably years to overcome.  We therefore need your support in any way you can manage so that we can continue to help those in need.

>We need additional funding:- We will ship out whatever aid you supply or fund over the coming months.  ( In the case of Haiti we were able to turn your £240k of support direct into aid .)

>We need as many Standard  Aquaboxes to be funded,  packed and returned as we can muster.  (See our "Aquabox Support" page)

>We need to pack as many "Gold" Aquaboxes in our Depot as possible

YOUR  help is needed by those who are suffering at the sharp end of this disaster.  We can help them through your support of Aquabox.

03/08/2010 Pakistan and Aquaboxes

We will be shipping all our Standards out by sea through  Feed the Children and air freighting out as many AquaFilter Community units we can muster from the production team based up in Sunderland, probably about ten units; each capable of handling 300 litres/hour and will have a life in excess of 500,000 litres.

Your continued support to help replenish the £30k of Aquaboxes and Aquafilters stocks we have just agreed to ship out to Pakistan is greatly appreciated.

03/08/2010 Pakistan Floods

We are actively looking to our associates to ship out whatever stock we have. (We are down to ~300 Standard Aquaboxes). 

We are taking to two agencies and a decison will need to be made very soon.

We will aim to be shipping out a several (at least five) AquaFilter Community units, each with a capacity of 300 litres/hour of potable water (and possibly five more next week) .

Incidentally, our present level of "donations" support over the last five weeks has been very weak.  At this level of support, we cannot afford to continue to ship nearly as  many Aquaboxes as we presently  do.

We DO need you donations to keep going. Please look to helping us, or more acurately, helping the victims of natural disasters.  Thanks.

30/07/2010 News from Hungary and Romania

We had the following e-mail back from the front line via Phil Shorthouse of Blythswood Care out in Serbia.... 

We must be doing somethings right!Thanks everyone for all your support

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Dear All

Both the Hungarian and Romanian organisations who received the aid this week are very pleased with the contents, below is the comment from Pastor Catalin in Suceava.

Phil Shorthouse. Corporate Aid Logistics Manager. Field Director for Serbia

 

 

 

 

26/07/2010 Aquabox and AquaFilter Attend Aid and International Development Forum, 2010, Washington DC

Aquabox and Aquafilter manned a stand at stand at this year's "Aid and International  Development Forum" in Washington DC last week.  We had a prime position due to a small but significant relocation of our stand to the end of an isle, and had the only active water clarification demonstration in the Hall with both Aquafilters demonstrating their ability to scrub sub micron red clay particles out of a contaminated feed water.    

We had exceptional level of interest with little or no time to even make notes on the individual visitors before the next one stopped by. We proved that the two AquaFilter units are indeed unique in both detailed design and functionality within our target market sector with only one other unit vaguely targeting the same market and price sector.

There is a reasonable probability that there could  be a significant need for the AquaFilter units in the Aid business.  For example, a logistics group servicing NGO's covering South America and the Caribbean out of Panama showed great interest in the possibility of stocking Aquafilters (and maybe Aquaboxes) in their local Free Port should their clients similarly like the product. Many other delegates wanted units to send out to relatives living in Africa .  

As a secondary objective, we also were looking for help in distributing our Aquaboxes and we had a number of promising offers that now have to be nurtured to a point that,hopefully, they begin to bare fruit.

26/07/2010 Blythswood Care

26/07/2010 Romanian and Hungarian flooding

There has been major flooding in Romania and Hungary.  Blythswood Care are on site and have requested Aquabox support. 

24/06/2010 Rotary request for help for Calderas Community, Guatamala, met.

On May 27th, the Pacaya volcano erupted sending  a massive cloud of ashes into the air.  The capital city, Guatamala, some 25 km from the volcano had up to 75mm of volcanic ash in the streets.

This was followed the next day by the AGATHA, the first tropical storm of the season, that resulted is severe mudslides that merged into rivers that seriosly local communities.

"Guatemala 's Pacaya volcano started erupting lava and rocks Thursday afternoon, blanketing the country's capital with ash and forcing the closure of the international airport. A television reporter was killed by a shower of burning rocks when he got too close to the volcano, about 15 miles (25 kilometers) south of Guatemala City . In the village of Calderas , close to the eruption, Brenda Castaneda said she and her family hid under beds and tables as marble-sized rocks thundered down on her home.

"We thought we wouldn't survive. Our houses crumbled and we've lost everything," Castaneda said while waiting for rescue teams to take them to a shelter at a nearby school."

We (Aquabox) were approached by a member of the Roatry Club of Ermita (Guatamala City), asking for help for the people of Calderas Community who live in the shadow of the Pacaya Volcano and who in particular suffered at the hands of the  two almost coincident major natural disasters.

We have shipped a container of 500 Aquaboxes to help the Mayan people of Calderas Community.

25/05/2010 Big "Thank You" from Hungary

We recieved the following e-mail "Thank You" from Bylthswood Care:-.

Hi everyone,  the following report has just been received from one of our Hungarian partners.   It was a blessing to have the Aquaboxes and food in place.  Action in delivery in 24hours.  

 Hello, sorry for not being able to answer you earlier. We don't know if you heard that Hungary is facing quite serious flood situation right now. We must tell you that  the Aquaboxes received from Blythswood Care and Rotary Club were just fantastic  in this situation.  ADRA is collaborating with the East Hungarian Rescue team.  They have been on the ground within the first 24 hours. During this week we have been working day and night to help those affected immediately with rescue work, food from our warehouse, blankets and everything what we could do. The situation is still ongoing.

10/05/2010 A big "Thank You" (to ALL our supporters) from Humanity First on behalf the People of Haiti

We recieved the following e-mail from Humanity First.....

But first of all we,  Aquabox, would not have been able to help a small but very significant number of families in Haiti without all your help through generous donations or in gifts inkind to facilitate these donations of water and humanitarian aid.   On your behalf, we thank all those within Humanity First, and especially their front line medical team in Port au Prince under the Direction of Dr Daud,  for their help in distributing the Aquaboxes on our behalf. 

Just under 2,500 boxes have been distributed through Hamanity First with an nominal value of £245,000.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Dear Aquabox 

....Meanwhile, on behalf of Humanity First, please permit me to thank all members of the Rotary Club of Wirksworth and your many volunteers from Derby and other places in the UK for purchasing, collecting, assembling and packing the Aquaboxes and putting up with all the administrative associated work thus enabling us to deliver these much prized gifts on your behalf to the deserving people of Haiti.  Thank you once again.

We look forward to working with you again soon.

Mansoor Shah

 ......................................................................

I ditto the comments of Mr. Mansoor Shah. Our whole team and the people of Haiti are very grateful for this donation. Please extend our heartfelt gratitude and thanks to every one across the ocean.  

Regards,
Dr. Aslam Daud
Medical Team Leader
Humanity First; Port Au Prince

25/04/2010 New Aquabox and Aquafilter Newsletter

The lastest Aquaboxes and AquaFilters newsletter coverinng the latest steps in testing and evaluation of aqufilters is attached.

History

The Standard Aquabox is very effective in delivering safe water in emergencies, but the use of chemical tablets with a carbon filter means have a relatively limited and finite capacity.   So Aquabox and The Safe Water Trust have been working together for the last two years to find a longer lasting solution.

The Aquafilters use membrane technology to provide portable cost effective hand operated filter units.

Research in the field identified two requirements; a water supply for schools, hospitals, and other organised communities, and a water supply for families .

  Aquafilter Community

This fits into a Standard Aquabox. The box is filled with water, and the filter clipped onto the side. The user then just has to pump to get drinking water at the rate of 1 litre a minute.

A washable gauze filter first removes the larger particles, and the membrane removes the smaller biological contaminants. Excess water flows up and down the membrane, keeping it free from clogging.

Periodic maintenance includes greasing the pump seal from built in grease store; replacing the pump seal with a spare attached to the piston rod; and chemical washing with a tablet from an attached pot. The unit can also be fastened to a bucket, a jerry can with a hole cut in it, or a traditional ceramic jar.

  Present Cost to sponsor a unit :- ~£20

  AquaFilter Community

The Aquafilter Community was developed for schools and other organisations, and fits into an Aquabox Community. This makes for easy storage and transport as part of an Aquabox consignment. The Aquabox Community will replace Aqua30’s

  It operates by a hand pump, and delivers up to 300 litres of drinking water an hour.       

  It has a washable gauze pre filter to remove solid particles followed by a membrane filter which removes biological contaminants. The membrane is washed by reverse flushing.

  Periodic maintenance includes greasing the piston seal with grease supplies from a built in container, seal replacement by a new seals stored on the piston rod, and chemical washing with tablets stored on the unit.

  Present Cost to sponsor a unitr:- £250

Leaflet attached 

17/04/2010 China Earthquake: China is claiming physical self sufficiency but is looking for financial aid.

Hi, thank you for extending your help during this difficult period.  

I have just called CCF (China Charity Federation) to convey your message, and they have informed me that the affected area already has enough relief materials on hand, as tents, water, coats and other relief materials, both in cash and in kind, are continuously flowing to the frontlines after the quake occurred. At the moment what they most need is precious time to find and save as many people as they can.   CCF has already stopped receiving relief materials and their relief work has just moved to the second stage to raise money for the post-quake construction.

The chief of CCF asked me to forward you their gratitude, and I have to personally express my deepest appreciation and thanks to you for your offer during these trying time as well.    Thank you again for your help to our people, we know that you will always be the first to offer assistance in times of need.   Willa Wang (Ms)

16/04/2010 China Earthquake: Yushu county - Qinghai province

We have appraoched our Chinese link that helped to broker our sending of our Aquaboxes to the victims of the 2008 Earthquake to see whether Aquaboxes would be required in Quinhai and with whom we should liase in order to support those in distress.

We await the response.

15/04/2010 Another 1000 Aquaboxes Shipped to Haiti; Total of Aquabox Aid to Haiti ~£230k

We have just dispatched a further 1000  Aquaboxes plus two AquaFilter Community units to Haiti for distribution by our associate Humanity First.  The shipment was held up by a new tier of bureaucracy introduced by the Haiti Government requiring primary customs clearance of a shipment before dispatch from the UK .

This makes the total number of Aquaboxes shipped to Haiti so since mid Januray ~2,500 plus 58 Aqua30s' plus 6 AquaFilter Community units each of which are capable of producing up to 500,000 litres of potable water. 

After taking account of some exceptional shipping costs with respect to Haiti, the total value of our Aquabox aid to date that we have sent to Haiti on your behalf is ~£230,000.

27/03/2010 David Milliband Praises Aquabox

FOREIGN Secretary David Miliband has praised the Derby Telegraph's Aquabox campaign for the help it has given to the people of Haiti. The cabinet member visited a Derbyshire factory yesterday as part of his hectic pre-election schedule. He found time to praise Telegraph readers for helping to raise £220,000 for the paper's Aquabox campaign.

Based in Wirksworth, Aquabox sends water purification kits to victims of natural disasters, wars and poverty. The devices are packed inside a blue plastic box, which also includes essentials such as tools, cooking equipment and hygiene items. They have been used in Haiti following a devastating earthquake in the Caribbean country which killed 200,000 people and left more than one million homeless.

Mr Miliband said the amount raised was a fantastic achievement. He said: "Thanks to the Derby Telegraph and thanks to the generosity of the people of Derby and their fantastic commitment to helping this cause.

"The British Government is honoured to match the generosity of the people of Britain in helping after what was a terrible disaster.

"It speaks volumes for the humanity of the people of Britain that so much has been raised."

Aquaboxes Distribution in Andrea Pradesh (India)

  Pictures from Andra Pradesh, Thanks to Dr Ravi Vadlamani, Past District Govenor of District 3150.

Zinkapalem and Gorrelamandi Villages in Krishna District.

District 1620 (Belgium) Sponsor 250 Aquabox Golds

 Dilip Mirchandani, Chairman International Commission, RI District 1620, Belgium sent us £20,000 as sponshorship of 250 Aquabox Golds.  22 of the boxes were sponsored by the local Rotoract clubs.

We had a photoshpoot with our

District 1220 Governor                                      Tony Stimpson
District 1220 Governor Nominee                         Gordon McGlone
District 1220 International Committee Chair         Kate Dumelow
Rotary Club of Wirksworth Club President           Peter  Watson
Chairman of Aquabox Trustees:                          Mike Tomlinson

We thank District 1620 for their generous support.  The first of their 250 Aquabox Golds will be shipped out to Port au Prince later this week.

16/03/2010 Next Container Load ready to go to Port au Prince.

We will be shipping a third container of 630 Aquaboxes to Haiti via Humanity First now we have enough Aquaboxes returned and back in stock.  An additional three new-technology AquaFilter Community units will also be shipped out to add to the two units already in place.  One of which is servicing Humanity First's medical centre.  The others will be going to an orphange or two and other smaller communities.  Each AquaFilter Community unit is capable of producing 300 litre/hour of potable water and will have a life of not less than 500,000 litres.

These five AquFiliter Community units alone should offer the displaced Hatians  an  additional capacity of 2,500,000 litres of potable water.

Logistics through to Port au Prince are presently being organised.

This load will top up our shipments to Hatians to 2090 boxes with a value in the order of  £200,000 including a nominal cost of freight and distribution. 

Your help is needed to enable us to keep shipping more Aquaboxes to those in need in Haiti.  Please keep on supporting us in whatever way you can.  By filling boxes, sponsoring Golds or cash donations.  Any type of support  is most welcome and will be appreciated by those we can reach.  Do not forget that there are 3,000,000 displaced Hatians who will be in need of your help for very many months, and probably years to come and unfortunately, the annual rainy season is about to start to add to their problems.

Aquaboxes, with our humanitarian aid contents, have long term value to those in need.

05/03/2010 Chilian Earthquake Update

The Chilean Government is restricting external humanitarian help by issuing licenses to do so to a limited number of aid agencies.  To control the humantarian support, they are only licensing those aid agencies who already had a presence in country before this latest disaster struck.

Our present partner, Humanity First, did not have a registered presence prior to the latest disaster and so, althoigh thye had a medical team on standby,  they will not be sending in their medical teams.  

Because of the ongoing need in Haiti is very long term and greater, we will continue to support Haiti for the time being.

01/03/2010 Chilian Earthquake; March 1st; Uncertain level of damage

It is still dificult to determine how much damage has been sustained and in particular how many people have been made homeless.  The latest reports imply that the tsunami wave along the coast of Chili has done significant damage and made many homeless.  Especially in the old fishing town of Conception.

We will be keeping in touch with our assocaited to detmermine what is best and whether our particular type of aid should be diverted from Haiti.  We only have a finite amount of aid we can ship.

"About 1.5 million homes have been damaged. Most of the collapsed buildings were of older design - including many historic structures.

About 90% of the historic centre of the town of Curico was destroyed. Many roads and bridges across the affected area were damaged or destroyed.

One US risk assessor, Eqecat, put the value of the damage at between $15bn and $30bn (£9.8bn-£19.6bn) or 10-20% of gross domestic product. "  BBC page

27/02/2010 Chilian Earthquake

The epicentre of the massive 8.8 on the Richter Scale earthquake in Chile was on a fairly underpopulated part of the Chilian Coast, 70 miles north of Conception (population 250,000).  The depth of earthquake at 35km is "deep" by recent earthqake standards so surface ruptures may be minimal.  There have been some deaths recorded which will no doubt increase as the full extent becomes apparent. 

The immediate concern arising from this earthquake is the possibe impact of the resulting  tsunami that could have devasting impact on the inhabitants the islands and distant lands as the wave travels West across the Pacific.

The residual earthquake was still 7.0 on the Richter scale 200 miles away to the north in Santiago, the Chilian capital.  The first pictures show considerable damage to the older, religious, buildings.  The more modern buildings should be more earthquake resistant but only time will tell us how many lost thi eir lives, how many people  have been displaced and the level of damage their homes have sustained. 

In the meantime and until we know more, we will continue to send support out to Haiti where 3,000,000 people have been displaced and 300,000 died.  Our aid is of particular value to families as they return to rebuild their lives and their homes.

Update "February 28th"

"It seemed that a combination of strict building regulations in Chile and tsunami alarms throughout much of the region had averted what President Michelle Bachelet had initially called a “catastrophe”.

The worst damage was inflicted on Concepcion, Chile’s second-largest city and the closest to the quake’s epicentre 70 miles out to sea. First reports described screams and cries from the ruins of a 15-storey building."  

  Government Officials said  " ..... they did not expect the toll to rise much above the official toll of 214."

27/02/2010 Please Continue to Fill and Return Standard Aquaboxes

The number of Standard Aquabxes being requested and returned has fallen off over the last couple of weeks.  We for our part can only pack a certain number of Aquabox Golds.  So please remember that we are  very dependent upon your support , especially with respect to the the filling and return of  Standard Aquaboxes.

Please continue with the  filling and return of these Standards so that we can continue to ship out our Aquaboxes to those in need.

24/02/2010 Aquabox Canada (R C of Straford) Shipment To Haiti

Our colleagues, the Rotary Club of Stratford who operate the Aquabox scheme in Canada, have just shipped 246 Aquaboxes into Port au Prince via GlobalMedic.

We for our part have shipped some additional chlorine tablets from our stock over to Canada so they can continue packing Aquaboxes for Haiti. 

17/02/2010 Haiti Update;- Feb 16th. A Further Container Load dispatched

Our boxes have particular value at the time the families return to their homes to try to rebuild their lives. In the case of the Haitians, this will be for very many more months and possibly years to come.

We have just dispatched a further 630 Aquaboxes to Haiti making 1558 Aquaboxes in a month with a nominal value of £131,000 of humanitarian and water aid; before freight charges.  We will continue to ship out our boxes for as long as you are giving us the wherewithal to do so.

We have shipped the first production AquaFilter Community unit out Haiti with this shipment for evaluation while a larger batch is being prepared.  This is so our associates can get a feel for how best to deploy this new, exciting, technology before we ship out the first batch.

21/02/2010 Humanity First: Thank You Aquabox Supporters on behalf of the Haitian People

……. I thought I must write to you to thank you for the excellent relationship that has begun to evolve between our organisations as a result of your efforts. We can never thank the many people who volunteered their valuable time in collating and packaging the Aquaboxes. I have myself seen the surprise and smiles on the faces of disaster stricken people who have opened the boxes and assure you that it beats the smile on anyone opening a Christmas packet.

We can, therefore, only request that you communicate to the many donors our most sincere thanks. Humanity First is aware that it speaks on behalf of the victims of the earthquake in Haiti that despite the many different kind of items sent as aid by other NGOs, your Aquaboxes rank high up on the top. We are confident that we express the seemingly silent but true thanks of the Haitian people to your donors and volunteers.

I have not personally seen the Aquafilter Community Set but am extremely interested in its potential and shall be contacting you to see how it can be best used in drought or flood stricken remote parts of Africa .

Meanwhile many thanks.   
Mansoor Shah
Acting Chairman Humanity First

17/02/2010 A Message From Mike Wilkinson, President of Royal Leamington Spa Rotary Club

Courier Article 1
Courier Article 2

17/02/2010 The Glasgow and Galloway Diocese of the Scottish Episcopal Church Donation of £12,801.37p

  The Glasgow and Galloway Diocese of the Scottish Episcopal Church have donated £12,801.37p to Aquabox from their Lent collections in 2009.  

The cheque was presented by The Very Reverend Dr Gregor Duncan, Bishop-Elect and the Right Reverend Dr Idris Jones, retiring Bishop.   The cheque was received on behalf of Aquabox by Rotarian Gordon McGlone at a presentation specially arranged at the Stewart Memorial Fountain in Kelvingrove Park, Glasgow.  

Pupils from Dowanhill Primary School joined the celebration and held up banners showing the total collected.  

The Fountain, built 150 years ago, was erected in memory of Provost Robert Stewart who worked to ensure a safe supply of water was made available to the people of Glasgow. It has recently been renovated and was not due to be turned on until spring, but the Council kindly turned it on for the presentation.  

The day was organised by Rotarian Ian Dickson from the Rotary Club of Irvine Seagate and attended by the 1230 District Governor, other Rotarians and members of the Diocese.

09/02/2010 Haiti:- February 9th, 14th;- Second Container Shipement Scheduled

We anticipate shipping the second container to Port au Prince on Wednesday, February 17th.

We will be sending a second container of 618 Aquaboxes to Haiti within the next two weeks.

So please keep on supporting us in any way possible, feel assured that your support will be put to good use.

Our water and humanitarian aid is of long term value, especailly when families begin to return from the refugee camps and look to rebuilding  both their lives and their familiy homes.  Our aid was still being greatly appreciated nine months after the 2004 /2005 Tsumami.

02/02/2010 Haiti:- February 3, a further 618 boxes left for Port au Prince

Wednesday February 3rd Update:-   Another 618 boxes leave depot on route to Port au Prince;  including 30 Aqua30's.

February 2nd:  We have a container load booked to leave our depot Wednesday, 3rd February.  This will be shipped via the Dominican Republic and may take up to 21 days or so.  But since our air-freighted batch of 200 Aquaboxes took nine days to get Port au Prince, we are happy to be going by sea.   The ports will be less chaotic and cluttered than the airport area.

As mentioned before, our Aquaboxes have long term value to the recipient families.  It is the time when they feel confident enough to go back to repair or rebuild their homes that our aid comes into our own.  They will be welcomed for many months to come if not years even.

 We hope that we will have a second container load available for shipping within the next coule of weeks. The value of the our 818 Aquaboxes boxes comes to over £70,000 worth of aid.   

07/02/2010 Help From District 7350 USA

e-mail from Rob Breckinridge

You are most welcome!  We had several clubs step up after the Haiti earthquake and they will be pleased to know that their contributions will help there.  I hope that we will receive additional donations in the coming weeks, as well.

Here is a breakdown of the contributions: Rotary Club of Altoona Sunrise (Pennsylvania) - 1 Aquabox Gold Rotary Club of Bedford (Pennsylvania) - 1 Sponsored Aquabox Rotary Club of Claysburg (Pennsylvania) - 10 Sponsored Aquaboxes Rotary Club of Cumberland (Maryland) - 1 Sponsored Aquabox Rotary Club of Curwensville (Pennsylvania) - 3 Sponsored Aquaboxes Rotary Club of Emporium (Pennsylvania) - 1 Aquabox Gold Rotary Club of Hagerstown (Maryland) - 1 Aquabox Gold Rotary Club of Hollidaysburg (Pennsylvania) - 2 Aquabox Golds Rotary Club of Huntingdon (Pennsylvania) - 1 Sponsored Aquabox Rotary Club of Long Meadows (Maryland) - 1 Aquabox Gold Rotary Club of State College Sunrise (Pennsylvania) - 3 Sponsored Aquaboxes Rotary Club of Tyrone (Pennsylvania) - 1 Aquabox Gold and 6 Sponsored Aquaboxes

 We also had one Club President make an individual contribution.  Tracy Barlup of the Rotary Club of Hagerstown contributed for 1 Aquabox Gold.

When or if you have pictures of Aquaboxes in Haiti, I would be most interested in using them to help publicize what the District has been able to do. 

 Yours in Rotary, Rob Breckinridge

26/01/2010 Haiti; January 26th

Our first 200 boxes were transferred from Heathrow to Amsterdam and were booked on last night’s evening flight to Miami .  Since confirmed that they arrived in Miami Tuesday morning  Jan. 26th.

We now have enough boxes to ship a container load as soon as the route has been established and confirmed and the receiving agent is in a position to receive our boxes.

Our sister Aquabox Scheme in Canada, run by the Rotary Club of Stratford,  have sent 100 Aquaboxes with extra filter sets via World Vision and hope to send a further 500 Aquaboxes over the next few weeks. 

The news on the ground appears to be that the senior agencies are now reasonably bedded down after a first week of chaos all round.  The last major logistical problem within Port au Price itself seems to have been the lack of fuel.  However the freight inwards logistics are still a problem with limited access direct into Port au Prince airport, now under American command.  The shipping routes have yet to be confirmed.  We are increasingly hopeful that we can begin to lift our shipments without unduly interfering with the first tier emergency aid agencies and their first line emergency relief efforts.

To that end, our Standard Aquaboxes are particularly of medium term value in that our humanitarian aid is designed to help families rebuild their lives and homes while giving the family safe potable water so reducing tummy infections and the need to buy medicines.  Back in 2005, we were shipping Aquaboxes into communities in and around the Banda Ache area  some nine months after the Tsunami hit.  The recipients were extremely grateful even after such a delay. 

Our Aqua30's offer long term water aid for hospitals and schools.  While our new Aquafilter units will be much more effective in meeting this role.

Your response has been magnificent with very significant donations from individuals, schools, Cubs, Scouts, Churches and of course Rotary and Inner Wheel Clubs with much promised.  We have more than doubled our rate of packing Gold Aquaboxes and will continue to ship Aquaboxes out for as long as you fund us to do so.  Haitians will have a need for Aquaboxes to enable them to rebuild the lives and family homes for many  many months and probably years to come. 

21/01/2010 Haiti:- January 21st

It really does not surprise me but our part cargo load has been bumped off/aborted by the carrier. (They specialise in disaster management cargos.) They are as of today now only taking single-client chartered loads.  This will be undoubtedly be due to the major aid agencies (Oxfam, Red Cross,   MSN etc) needing to fly in their first line  and replacement stocks for that written off under the rubble of their Caribbean strategic stockpile warehouses.

Our agent is actively working on finding an alternative carrier and maybe even a possible different route in.   So I am personally quite happy to wait on the tarmac until the first line medical, sanitation and water distribution requirements are sorted. 

There are major fuel shortages at present holding up aid work and water distribution in particular.  Our American friends taking control of the airport have, in part, helped but in part hindered by restricting aid agency flights IN so that they can get their troops and heavy support  equipment IN.  In their eyes, "securing" the country has a higher weighting than humanitarian aid.   One has to be wary of the military’s secondary agendas.   The Haitian experience over the last few decades of outside  ”help” from many quarters does not bode well.   In this case, we can only hope that it will be more altruistic.   Only time will tell.

We will be looking to ship in a full container in by sea as soon as our agents have resolved the best way in: probably into Santo Domingo docks and then onward in a lorry convoy over the mountains into Haiti .

At this point in time, the shipping route, once clarified may actually get there first.  One is reminded of the Tortoise and the Hare.

19/01/2010 Haiti Update; January 19th

17/01/2010 Haiti Update; 17th January 2010

The position on the ground is improving only very very slowly.  There are many senior aid agencies out there, The UN, Oxfam  and Red Cross to name but three, who have large permanent staff based in Port Au Prince,  but they had planned on the assumption that they would be catering for hurricane damage and not earthquake damage.  Most serve the whole of the Caribbean out of Port au Prince.  But a  lot of the in-country emergency stocks are just not available (presumably under rubble) and they are having to look to fly in fresh stocks.  This has exacerbated the situation.

We are continuing to explore ways in and we have firm offers from two of our sister organisations.  But of course the airport is still largely locked up, the road from  Santo Domingo airport in the   Dominican Republic is now open but is very poor condition.  It is taking 18 hours to travel 200 miles (as the crow flies) from Port au Prince by truck.  The Port au Prince port (only a single two sided 200m quay and one derrick)  has been damaged.

However, as said before, we will not be looking to being overly pushy until the rescue work is truly under way and law and order has been established.  From the experience of the 2004-2005 Tsunami, our aid has long term value.  We were still shipping in Aquaboxes into Banda Ache well over nine months after the event (we shipped over 7000 boxes direct into Northern Sumatra alone ).  They were greatly appreciated by those in need.  Interestingly enough, Oxfam, literally only  last month, finally closed down their Tsunami 2004 account.

So we will keep on looking for the best way in but will not be getting in the way for the first response rescue operations. 

We are likely to be in for the long term with this one.

So please keep on supporting us in any way possible, feel assured that your support will be put to good use.

13/01/2010 Hati Earthquake Victims

am:  We shall be endeavouring to get Aquaboxes into Port Au Prince in support of the latest Earthquake victims as soon as practical. 

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>.

pm Update: -we are reasonably confident that we will be able to airfreight in an initial batch of Aquaboxes and we will then endeavour to ship in a full container as soon as stocks are replenished to allow such a shipment. 

So please return any outstanding filled Standard Aquaboxes you may in your possession as soon as practical. 

Please consider filling a Standard Aquabox for shipping out when circumstances on the ground are right.     Thanks.

Thursday 14th.  We will not be pushing to get our Aquabox Aid into Haita until the front line emergency services of the big aid agencies have got in and stabilised the situation.

“We are still being told that SDQ airport is still not accepting any more relief flights and cannot offload there. The only way a flight can stop in SDQ is for tech-stop to refuel, otherwise the carriers have been flying endless loops to get into PAP today.

We were told that the US Military is in the process of establishing priorities which are now the flights containing rescue teams, then the actual military flights, then relief flights with food / water / medicine. Otherwise, nothing else gets in at this time or until further advised. Today, the holding time on the ground in PAP was so long due to lack of handling, equipment and overall ramp congestion. “

14/01/2010 Aquaboxes in Support of Flood Victims in Albania

We will be sending 180 Aquaboxes out to Albania early next week in support of Blythswood Care Childrens mission.  See below.

Albania  Hit by Worst Foods in Decades

Tirana | 11 January 2010 |  undefined undefined undefined undefined undefined undefined undefined undefined

Flooding in Shkodra

undefined undefined undefined undefined undefined undefined Thousands of people have been evacuated in Northern Albania as the country’s struggles to control its worst flooding in nearly half a century.

Albanian authorities continued to discharge water from three hydro-power plants on the Drin River on Monday, after danger levels were reached following weeks of heavy rainfall and melting snow.

On Sunday Albania ’s President Bamir Topi responded to speculation in the media over the safety of the dams, striving to assure the public that the dams will not break. “The situation is improving fast and this will affect the flooded areas hopefully with a sense of optimism,” said Topi in a statement. “I want to assure the public the Drin River dams have a high level of safety,” he added.

According to the national emergency task force set up to deal with the situation over 4,000 people have so far been evacuated from their homes and 2,200 homes have been flooded by rising water in the Shkodra district, north of the capital Tirana and close to the border with Montenegro.

A total of 10,270 hectares of farmland is flooded and 9,830 livestock are at risk. Because of serious damages to the water supply system, many in the flooded communities don’t have access to drinking water. There are damages to agriculture and transport infrastructure, making the area around Shkodra only accessible by small boats.

Several EU countries, Moldova and Kosovo have responded to Tirana’s call for help by sending in boats, electricity generators, water pumps, food, medicine, tents and other aid to the flood victims.

Phil

Phil Shorthouse. Corporate Aid Logistics Manager. Regional Office 01634 291411

Blythswood's child sponsorship programme has improved the lives of children in India and Africa .
Go to
www.blythswood.org

01/11/2009 INTRODUCING A JOINT MANIFEST AND CUSTOMS DECLARATION FORM

We have had increasing difficulty in getting Customs clearance and the excuse in part is due to each Standard Aquabox filled by our supporters being unique.  We have been asked for a detailed manifest for each and every Aquabox in a shipment/ container.

It is proposed that we ask each sponsor to fill in and sign the attached joint  MANIFEST and AQUABOX CUSTOMS DECLARATION FORM for each Standard Aquabox they pack and to stick these on the side of the Aquabox by using the  waterproof document adhesive envelopes provided.

If your Aquabox does not contain this form, could you please download the form below and place the completed and signed form inside the box on top of the overall water barrier bag and, when you return it, we will place the form in the transparent“ document pocket" sleeve and "stick" it on the side of your Standard Aquabox on your behalf.  Please ensure that you have signed it. 

This should at least remove one element of why customs officials may sometimes  be rather reluctant to clear our goods.

Customs Declaration Document

16/12/2009 Derby Telegraph Appeal: Studio 2000, a Muay Thai boxing club, is backing the appeal.

Members of the gym will also be skipping, doing press-ups and sit-ups for the Derbyshire charity, which sends water purification kits to victims of natural disasters, poverty and war.

The charity, run by Wirksworth Rotary Club, is struggling for cash, with donations at their lowest in seven years, and a recent disaster in Indonesia having almost wiped out their existing stock.

And the funding crisis comes at a time when the charity is looking to introduce revolutionary Aquaboxes which use improved technology.

That is why the Derby Telegraph has launched its Give Water, Give Life campaign, to help raise the £138,000 needed for the devices, which make dirty water safe to drink.

Sai, director of Studio 2000 – a specialist Muay Thai boxing gym – is backing the campaign. He said: "It's a great cause. We are happy to help."

At the open day, which will take place at the gym in Spa Lane, two firemen, Alan Whitton and Steven Clarke, will also be skipping for an hour in uniform to raise money.

The charity sends out two types of water purification boxes which use carbon filters and chlorine tablets. But now, a new method for purifying water has been devised, using micropore technology filters.

The charity wants £100,000 to buy the AquaFilters for 5,000 AquaFilter Family kits, as well as £30,000 to pay for 100 larger AquaFilter Community units, which provide water to small communities, cottage hospitals and schools. They also need £8,000 to pay for ground rent to store them.

They have joined forces with the Derby Telegraph in appealing for help to raise cash for the filters, which it hopes to have by April.

David Haspel, trustee of the charity, said: "It is great to hear that people are getting behind us like this, and we are really grateful to Sai and everyone at the gym.

"At times of disaster, donations go up but we need to maintain stock throughout the year so the boxes are ready to go as soon as they are needed."

The open day, to which members of the public are invited, will take place on Sunday, January 24, from 12pm until 4pm.

07/12/2009 The Derby Telegraph launch an appeal to help Aquabox introduce our new micropore based AquaFilter technology

While covering the recent natural disasters and our support sent out to Western Sumatra, Hyderabad , India and the Philippines, The Derby Telegraph picked up that our  support has been over the last two years or so.  Maybe part due to the credit crunch, our monthly support finally dropped to the lowest point seen for seven years.

The Derby Telegraph has launched a sustained appeal that could run for months whose aim is to raise £138,000 to help fund the introduction of the new micropore AquaFilter technology in place of the old classic Chlorine and subsequent activated carbon scrubbing route.  The money will be used to fund the first 100 AquaFilter Community units and 5000 AquaFilter Family units plus the rent on a new warehouse module for one year to help us be able to build and stock the new units.

The articles are also listed on the Derby Telegraph website http://www.thisisderbyshire.co.uk/  and search for Aquabox.

01/11/2009 Support Still Needed

We have had a good response from our supporters over the last month and we give you a great big Thank You for that. 

However, our overall level of support is still averaging out to be  significantly lower than we have seen in recent years and so we will need to be prudent and cut back in our activities unless your support is both forthcoming and maintained at the levels equal to or greater than we were kindly given by you all a couple of years ago. Generally speaking, from the Tsunami year of 2005 up to the onset of credit crunch.

29/10/2009 Manilla Aquaboxes Distributed by Rotarians in Districts 3780, 3810 and 3820

The following e-mail came in via Ian Thomas of  Eltham RC Australia.

H-i Ian,

The Aquaboxes were turned over to the three Districts (3780, 3810 and 3820) last October 23 for distribution in their respective areas of coverage. I have requested all three districts to prepare a simple report with photos of their beneficiaries receiving the aquaboxes which I will then forward to you and a copy for the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD).

District Officers from all 3 districts and officials from the DSWD witnessed the turnover. In the last photo below, I am 3rd from the left next to the DSWD official(in red).

The shipments were very timely and the recipients very happy with the convenience that the aquaboxes provided. We don't know how to thank you enough for your generous contributions and quick response.

Please relay our utmost appreciation to your Rotary Club of Eltham and of course to the Rotary Club of Wirksworth in UK.

Regards,

Jesse Tanchanco, Rotary Club of Loyola Heights, RI District 3780, Quezon City, Philippines

TURN-OVER OF AQUABOXES

26/10/2009 Aquafilter Update

The feedback from The Gambia is most encouraging.  In addition, the Ultrafiltration fitted units are capable of removing all viruses (0.004 to 0.1 micron in diameter) including   poliomyelitis, meningitis and hepatitis to name but a few.

Our AquaFilter units are now being fitted and tested with Ultrafiltration units.

26/10/2009 Feedback on the Value of Aquaboxes from The Gambia

John and Gill Griffith have just returned from The Gambia where they have been following up the prototype AquaFilter Communitys out on field test.  While out there, they took time out to revist the homes of the earlier recipients of our Aquaboxes.  They found that the boxes were still at the cetre of their lives and very useful.  Not only are the households and children healthier, they are saving significant money they can rarely afford on not having to buy medicines for the children and themselves.  This money they save on not having to buy the medicines is now likely to be spent on the childrens' schooling.

See John and Gill's report below.

Visit to Gambia Oct 09      Feed Back from Distributed Aquaboxes.

In December 08 we helped in the distribution of Aquaboxes in two places in Gambia.

One was a poor urban area which had been severely flooded in the rainy season, Ebo Town. The other was rural area that had an influx of refugees from Senegal called Forni.  

We came back 10 months later to see how appropriate this form of aid was.

1 . No out breaks of cholera and the children no longer suffered from waterborne disease  Everyone we talked to emphasised  this and we could clearly see that the children were stronger and healthier. Again this autumn, there had been heavy rain and the open wells were full and flooded.  In previous years there had been cholera during the rainy season.

  2. Less money spent on medicine. Thus they had more money available for other essentials . Ebo town and Forni are very poor areas, and the people were managing but only just.

  3. Each Aqua box was located in a safe place. On a stand, with the lid on and always in the house. Clean cups were nearby.

    4. Using the Aqua box was part of the way of life. While we were in one house talking to the family a young boy (age about 7) ran in, took a cup and with the same hand, using his thumb pressed the tap and quickly filled his cup of water. After drinking he replaced the empty cup back on top of the lid on the box.

  5. The Humanitarian Aid in the box was appreciated and valued.

Each family who had received a box was told that any items a family did not need could be given or exchanged with neighbours, but if any items were found in the market it was a criminal offence.

6. All items were useful.

As the families (often 10 people or more) are large, more plates and spoons would be useful (see updated contents list for details).

  7. Allocation of Aquaboxes .

A full container of 618 boxes was sent to Gambia. Muslim Aid and the village council were very careful to give Aquaboxes to the families most in need. Each box number was recorded by a name.

  8. Aqua30s  

These were kept by the Mulim Aid Office and spare chlorine tablets and carbon filters were given to individual families as needed.  

  In these areas we found that Aquaboxes serve a very important role as short to medium term aid after a disaster. They provide clean water and essential items to people who are just managing to get by on a daily basis in normal times.

26/10/2009 AquaFilter Performance in The Gambia Exceeds Expectations

John and Gill Griffith recently returned from The Gambia where they were following up the prototype AquaFilter Community units out on field tests.  The AquaFilter technology is one that we, Aquabox,  have been jointly developing with John  and Gill to replace our Aqua30's.  Their performance has exceeded all expectations with one unit in the Gunjar school having produced over 4550,000 litres, more than 15 times the maximum capacity of each Aqua30, without any detectable loss in performance.  Their ultimate life is still unknown.. We are targetting to introduce AquaFilter Communiy units from January 2010 onwards.  The introduction of the AquaFilter Family unit will hopefully follow on a few months later.

  Summary   of Location of AquaFilter   Community Performance    The Gambia October 09 

The Safe Water Trust is developing a new water purifying system using membrane technology and a hand pump. We are using The Gambia as our test site.

We left 2 AquaFilters when we visited Gambia in Dec 08 and sent 5 more in May 09.

We returned in Oct 09 to evaluate them.

  In all the locations we visited we received positive feedback.

1.The filter was easy to use and working well, both mechanically and biologically.

2. There were less cases of water-born disease and the children were stronger.

3.The family therefore had to pay less money for medicine (a visit to a clinic is very cheap but then the family has to pay for the medicine which is expensive) and has more money for other essentials.    Muslim School in Gunjur

We took the Aquafilter to the school when we were in Gambia in Dec. 08.

Provides safe water for 500 school children and 100 adults

Tested water Oct 09 –

                   Water from well – 1ml contained     30 pathogenic e-coli

                                  Water from original filter –                        0 pathogenic e-coli

  (In October 09 one of the check valves was failing to work and leak had developed at hose clip.

We replaced the aqua filter with an improved design we brought from England.) 

Village of Timbuktu

Located Aqua filter next to the Well and provides safe water for 500 inhabitants.

We demonstrated the aqua filter on this visit, and returned one week later to find the filter now standing on two bricks as we had suggested and in use.

Water from well – 1ml contained            141 pathogenic e-coli

Filtered water -                                       0   pathogenic e-coli

  Brikama Jedda Muslim   School

Filter used since July 09. Initially in Headmasters Compound and since school opened in September in the school to provide 250 children with safe water.

Water from well – 1ml contained            152 pathogenic e-coli

Filtered water -                                       0 pathogenic e-coli

  Ebo Town -   A seriously flooded high population density area.   In previous years there had been outbreaks of cholera but since having Aquaboxes and now a filter the children were stronger and had suffered from less water-borne diseases

We left the filter that had already been used for 10 months at Gunjur Muslim School.

John had mended the valves and leak.

  We also left an AquaFilter Family at a neighbouring compound for the local councillor to trail for us.

  Badibu Village

We talked to Village Chairman who, by chance was at the Muslim Aid Office.

AquaFilter working well providing 300 people with safe water.

He said ladies worked as a team (so no-one got tired) around the well, chatting and using the filter.

1,800 children and adults are now drinking safe water.

AquaFilter Community           target £300

AquaFilter Family                   target £20

  The Safe Water Trust (a non-profit making company limited by guarantee)

John and Gill Griffith 16, Burdon Road, Cleadon , Sunderland, SR6.7RU

gillgrif@hotmail.com 

15/10/2009 Update on Andra Pradesh Flood Victims

We have received the following from Dr Ravi Valdamani via Val Leivers; Sherwood Sunrisers RC.

From Dr Ravi Vadlamani PSG District 3150 Hydrabad

The Aqua Boxes kindly donated by your district are on their way. I have identified Zinkapalem village which is an Island Village in the back waters of Krishna River as the main beneficiary. Another surrounding hamlet will receive the balance. The task on hand is to take the Aquaboxes by boat to the village sensitize the villagers on how to use them, distribute the same and then follow up their use. There are several other villages in the back waters.

There is another village with 400 house holds named ELICHETTIDIBBA which also needs help. I will be reporting to you and others on the progress. Maybe you can talk to other clubs and get their support.

Rotarians distributed 1250 Kits to the flood victims in four villages in Repalle yesterday. I was there with the Rotarians. Each kit contains groceries, set of new clothes, bed sheets and soap. The kit approximately cost Rs 1000. We are planning to give another 3000 Kits. So it will be a busy month for me.

Ravi

(Any additional support you can give would be most welcome.)

13/10/2009 Andhra Pradesh Aquaboxes already on route

We dispatched 160 Standard Aquaboxes and 40 Aqua30's this morning, within 24 hours of getting the go ahead. 

They will be flown into Hydrabad an onwards overland into Rotary District 3150.  This is the district that was badlly hit by the Christmas 2004 Tsunami although this time around, much of the whole state has suffered from the flooding.

12/10/2009 200 Aquaboxes to Andhra Pradesh

We have secured a route into Andhra Pradesh and we will be shipping ~200 Aquaboxes this week.

This route came about as a result of Val Levers (DG Elect) and Terry Levers of Sherwood Sunrisers R C. Terry and Val have been working in Andhra Pradesh for a number of years funding and overseeing the drilling boreholes and school desks through Foundation's matched funding scheme.

Their principal contact, PDG Ravi Vadlamani, has confirmed that he and his Rotary colleagues can hand handle the customs clearance and distribution.

We will have sent £80,000 of aid over the last two weeks. And this shipment will leave our Warehouse absolutely bare. So please return any "work in progress" Aquaboxes you may have around as soon as practical since we have a call for Aquaboxes in Africa via CART later this month so hopefully, we will get adequate stock in to meet this need by then.

10/10/2009 200 Aquaboxes sent to Padang Western Sumatra via LIF

We have just dispatched 200 Standard Aquaboxes by air to Padang with the help of the Lesuer International Foundation (LIF) on 9th October 2009 via DHL .This is in addition to the 40 Standard Aquaboxes that LIF have alreaday taken to Padang as part of their recent fact finding mission.

We look foreward to a strong follow up.

08/10/2009 Aquaboxes to Western Sumatra: Update

We have been waiting to hear from the evaluation of the situation on the ground. The team have have returned to Medan. And we now have confirmation that we can send 150 to 200 Aquaboxes to Padang via Medan Northern Sumatra.

This is basically the same route into Sumatra we used when we serviced the Tsunami victims in and around Banda Aceh. Our contacts are the same people, but some now in different organisations to Leuser International Foundation with whom we co-operated with back in 2005. It will take a little time to work out the details but suffice to say, we will be shipping out boxes "shortly" ; with luck and a following wind, within a couple of days.

In fact our contacts have already shipped 40 of our locally stockpiled Aquaboxes out to Padang and a further 20 out to Nias district using the truck that was donated by our colleagues, the Rotary Club of Chelwood Bridge to LIF back in 2005. These are remnants of our stockpile that LIF held on our behalf for just such a need. The other 560 or so stockpiled Aquaboxes have been distributed mainly within Sumatra over the last four years.

07/10/2009 Andhra Pradesh Flood Victims

" It never rains, it pours." We have yet another natural disaster on our hands, the fourth in the last ten days.

Andhra Pradesh and their neighbouring states, are suffering from the worst flooding they have had in ten years and it has been exacerbated by the authorities having to open up the sluice gates to keep the dams from bursting. Over 1.5 million people have been reported as being displaced and many are dead. We are in contact with Rotarians in Andhra Pradesh area (PDG Ravi Vadlamani (D3150) is in Guntur in the south of Andhra Pradesh which is a badly affected area) and we are hopeful of a successful outcome.

We should know within a couple of days. As mentioned before, we really are low on funds. We have just shipped £37,000 of aid to Manila, equivalent to just over six months of your donations based on last month’s level of donations. However we still have limited stocks left and are looking to helping in Padang as well as Andhra Pradesh. Whatever you can do to help would be greatly appreciated not only by us at Aquabox, but very much more so by those suffering as a result of the recent spate of natural disasters.

04/10/2009 Confirmation of Aquabox Shipments into the Philipines

We have been in contact with Aquabox Australia run by the Rotary Club of Eltham.

Ian Thomas has emailed to say they have just dispatched 102 mixed Aquabox Golds and Aqua30's to Samoa through AusAid this morning.

Eltham are also experiencing reduced funding as a result of the credit crunch so we will be supporting their shipments into Manila by air freighting 100 Aqua30's and 100 Aquabox Golds in support of their 100 mixed Aquaboxes and Aqua30's for onward distribution by Rotarians within Districts 3820, 3810 and 3870.

These left Cromford Depot on Wednesday October 7th.

In the meantime, we continue to explore our present, still active, possible routes together with looking to opening up some possible new routes for getting Aquaboxes into both Manila and Padang.

01/10/2009 Western Sumatra Earthquake and the Tsunami in Western and American Samoa

The earth is on the move.

The tsunami off the coast of Western Samoa and American Samoa was closely followed by another severe earthquake off the coast of Western Sumatra, Indonesia. And as I write another has been reported in Bolivia and Peru in South America but no associated devastation has been reported.

According to seismologists, it is most unlikely these two latest earthquakes in the Pacific are connected; they were caused by slippages in faults that took place 16 hours and 10,000km apart on two different tectonic plates. There are broadly two ways an earthquake can trigger another elsewhere, but neither seem likely in the Samoan and Western Sumatra cases.

Although this is the high season for hurricanes and typhoons and associated flooding, earthquakes have no particular pattern other than most (~90%) are around the Pacific Rim. These last three natural disasters over the last three days are just coincidence.

Unfortunately, the Tsunami that hit Western and American Samoa islands will be very difficult for us to reach logistically since they are both very small and isolated 600 miles and 1100 miles NE of Fiji respectively which in turn is at least 3000 miles to either New Zealand or Australia nearest coastlines. Since we are low on stocks and there is already a big need for help in both the Philippines and Western Sumatra, we are unlikely to be able to address this natural disaster.

In the case of the earthquake in Padang, Western Sumatra, we are optimistic in being to send them Aquaboxes.

But as mentioned before, we are short of stocks and we have seen a much reduced level of financial support in the last two months. So anything you can do to support us would be greatly appreciated.

29/09/2009 Manila Floods: Tropical Storm Ketsana Hits The Philippines

We are actively looking to see the best way into Manilla and are hopeful of a success outcome.

However, we are short of stock just at the moment and s o anything you can do to support us would be greatly appreciated.

28/09/2009 Credit Crunch Hits Donations but the Adoption AquaFilter Technology still On Course

Our support over the last few years has held up surprising well considering the competition for funds.  However, in this new 2009-2010  Rotary year, our support has waned considerably with August's donations the lowest seen for four years. While September's donations are well down at  below £6,000, or significantly less than half our normal monthly level of donations for the month.  This is the lowest monthly level of donations by quite a margin since my detailed monthly records start in 2004-2005 and possibly the lowest monthly take for over seven years.

We have responded by cutting back the packing Aquabox Golds to stock and we will limit the shipment of Aqua30's to only those in dire need of potable water (for example, in response to a cholera outbreaks) in order to limit the drain on our reserves.

We do NEED your support in order to keep going to help those in need and so please do not forget Aquabox in your support; even if the impact of the credit crunch is making the level of funds availble for you to donate more difficult to come by.

_________________________________________________________________

Our plans to move across to AquaFilter Technology are still in hand with the first "AquaFilter Community" units due in January 2010 and the introduction of "AquaFilter Family" units by April/May 2010.  These will give our target families access to  much greater  volumes of potable water for a similar investment from you.  We have budgeted for development costs associated with this transition.

23/09/2009 Report from The Gambia, Re Aquaboxes and Flood Victim Distribution

This is a report from the Muslim Aid field office in The Gambia.  It comments on the value of Aquabox contents to the victims.  Maybe more cloths and maybe less paper tissues and toys but otherwise a very positive feedback!  

Field Office The Gambia.

West Field Junction Sayerr Jobe Avenue.

Tel: 4439264/4439265.

PO Box 2906   SereKunda  

The Benefits of the Donated Aqua Boxes.

Before the distribution of the Aqua Boxes during the floods, Muslim Aid Gambia staff observed the following Situation in households and communities that benefited from the Aqua Boxes.

1.        Before their arrival in the Gambia there was none and people have not seen them before.

2.        There was very limited support to disaster victims and refugees.

3.        The women and children do not have enough cooking materials and clothing especially for children as well cleaning materials.

4.        Packing bags to save properties were also very limited.

5.        Safe drinking water was also a problem and it was also very difficult to reach out to the public taps due to recent flooding.

6.        It was also not safe to drink water from well in the KMC region of Ebou Town were the underground water was less than   5 meters deep and local sewages were flooded as well.  

7.        Some of the students lost their books in the flood.  

8.        Most of the disaster victims did not have simple tools to fix anything after the floods; they were waiting for assistance from donors and government.

Looking at the content of the Aqua Boxes it has provided the victims the following immediate needs;

-Cloth(e)s
- Cleaning Materials
- Safe drinking water
- Books, pens, and pencils
- Construction tools and materials
- Packing bags
- Cooking Utensils.

  This year the National Disaster Agency did a country wide distribution of Aqua Boxes and the feedback from the Regions according to the National Disaster Agency is that the people who received the Aqua boxes said that, the cooking pot s, stationeries and cloths are very good because it enabled them to cook quickly, and help the children with cloths and give something to make them busy.    A lot them said that school have just open, so the exercise books, pens and pencils and colour pencils are very useful,   because we’re thinking   of   paying schools fees, stationeries, and  uniforms for the children and unfortunately their houses are   all flooded and some totally destroyed,   and the entire community devastated but , their mood changes when they saw the Aqua boxes and   when some of them open them they were blissful with the content,   according to the National Disaster Committee of   KMC, one women   immediately used the survival bags to pack her reminding food stuffs and looked for clothes to help her children.

Some of the Victims brought who had nails in their boxes and other tools give it to the men working to repair the houses that were destroyed.

One of the beneficiaries who received the aqua box said, ‘’ the Aqua Box and the water purification tablet is very good because i don’t want to have any stomach problem from drinking the polluted water from the well, we will like to thank all those who provide these boxes for and we are praying for you in the bless month of Ramadan’’ Kaousou Colley.

The some of the people suggested more cloth(e)s in the boxes and less toys and tissues papers and papers.

05/09/2009 Aquaboxes Seen in Malawian Orphanage

A student, Lauren Klucknow, studying at the University of Newcastle wrote to us:-

I have been given your e-mail address from my Granny, Barabara Hopkinson, with regards to the Aquabox sent to the Chikondi & Mphatso Orphan Care Centre, Area 25, Lilongwe, where I was working in Malawi this summer vacation.  The Orphage is run by OSCA  - Orphan Care andd Social Rehabilitaion of Lilongwe. She said the you would be interested in seeing some of our photogtraphs and ......

I have attached two phtographs, one of the Aquabox and one a little girl after she had been given/put on her new clothes."

These Aquaboxes were distributed within Malawi by our associate CART.

29/07/2009 Blythswood Care say Thank You

Phil Shorthouse of Blythswood Care and a Rotarian visited Wirskworth and Aquabox  recently and gave us the following quote that we would like to share with you:-

Phil Shorthouse quote

"Although a Rotarian, I work as a full-time Relief Aid worker, and have seen the huge benefit the Aquaboxes have provided in areas struck by the Tsunami, Kashmir Earthquake, and flooding in Malawi, Serbia, Romania and Hungary.

The provision of clean water is vital, especially in the early days of a disaster.

Without doubt thousands of human beings have benefitted from The Rotary Club of Wisrksworth’s, AQUABOX project. A huge thank you to all who help this worthwhile cause"

Phil Shorthouse. PHF. Past President of Rochester Rotary club.

Corporate Aid Logistics Manager -Blythswood Care.

Phil giving President Mike Tomlinson (left) Rochester's Club banner.

03/07/2009 Aquabox and AquaFilter announce the all new AquaFilter Community at WASRAG

Aquabox and AquaFilter have been working on a replacement for Aqua30's based on the latest micropore technology.  The product of that collaboration was announced and shown at the Recent Water and Sanitation Rotarian Action Group (WASRAG) 2nd World Summit held in Birmingham as a lead into the recent  RI Convention held at the NEC.  It was generally well recieved. 

It is designed to supply potable water to small communites (1000 people say), Cottage Hospitals and Schools.  The Oxfam representative expressed a positive  interest in the unit from both a technology and capacity point of view. She has put is in contact with the appropriate Oxfam technical expert.  We shall be following this up together with requesting their coments  on our Aquabox Gold and the suitability of its contents to various types of disasters and their distribution around the globe.

The aim is to replace the "classic" chlorine tablet plus carbon filter based Aqua30's (with their capacity 33,000 litres of potable water) by a units  that have a much enhanced life and an even lower cost /unit of potable water. 

The unit is capable of generating 400litres/hour of potable water and has been designed to fit into an standard 75 litre Aquabox so it can be shipped in the same container.  There is no real limit to its life in the field other than possible algae growth that can be controlled by regular chlorine (or similar halogen based materials) dosing and general wear and tear incurred as a result of being in daily use.

There are five units out in the field being Beta tested; Gambia, Rawanda, Honduras, Lebanon and Sierra Leone.  Feed back to date has been very positive.

The first production unit, the AquaFilter Mark 1, is now being tested for being "fit for purpose." 

We hope to start shipping AquaFilter Community units with our Standard Aquaboxes "in the Autumn 2009."

Hailstones the Size of Golfballs Damage Village Roofs in Hungary

Hailstones the size of "golfballs" seriously damaged the roofs of houses in a Hungarian village.  The pictures show residual hailstones more the size of mobile phones. There has also been major flooding in the area.

Blythswood Care are sending 100 Aquaboxes to help.

03/07/2009 Aquaboxes to India and Zimbabwe

CART are shipping 100 boxes each into India and Zimbabwe in support of their associates.

27/05/2009 Aquaboxes to Pakistan SWAT and FATA regions

Over 2.3 million people have been displaced in the SWAT valley and FATA regions during May 2009 regions as a result of the Pakistan Government looking to eliminate the Taliban groups in the two regions.

We are sending 616 Aquaboxes into Islambad for onward ditribution by the Pakistan Msthenia Welfare Organistion. 

A further consignment will be departing for Pakistan within a week. 

25/05/2009 Aquabox relaunched website passes 100,000 hits in 26 months

Thank you for keeping up date, we have just passed the 100,000 web hits since we updated our web suite back in March 2007.

We passed the 40,000 mark in mid April 2008 and have had a further 60,000 hits up to May 2009. My own number of hits is not insignificant in maintianing the site but the even taking these away would make no discernable difference.  We are now averaging  well over 1000 hits/week.  Fantastic.

So thank you for keeping an eye on our charity and hopefully will maintain your interest and hopefully be supportive of our Charity.  We aim to serve.

10/05/2009 Egyptian Customs holding up Gaza Shipment

We think thta this problem has finally been resolved and the Aquaboxes are now on the move again (25/05/09)

Our shipment to Gaza is haveing problems within Egypt where the customs officials are insisting that a full inventory is made for all the contents of each and every Aquabox.  All 618 boxes.  Well over 60,000 items according how one writes the inventory. This is first for us. 

We are not sure whether the customs offiicers will continue to insist or whether common sence will prevail and they open up a small randon sample of boxes instead.  But with the Standard Aquaboxes all being unique, it could be quite a challenging task. But eitherway, we hope that this being a first, will also be the last such request.

24/04/2009 Italian Earthquake and L'Aquila

We tried all ways to get a response from the local organisations and Rotarians.  We eventually got an indirect reply from the District Govenor who also happeneed to be a amember of the local L'Aquila Rotary Club.  He did not recognise our e-mails, nor the plight of the local people,  but merely said that there was no need for any further support for the displaced local people and that he would be opening a fund to help rebuild the University.  He just happens to be a Professor at the L'Aquila University. 

30/03/2009 Aquaboxes for Gaza

Having spent the last four weeks trying to send boxes into Sri Lanka to no avail (see below 03-03-09), we are now shifting tack and targettting a container load into Gaza to help alleviate the hardship that the Palestinians families suffered as a result of the last conflict.

A container left Cromford on the 1st April 2009 with 618 Aquaboxes.  The shipment is passing through Cairo where it will be handled by the Egyptian Medical Syndicate for foward distribution within Gaza by National Association of Modernisation and Development.

23/03/2009 Aquabox Call for Australian Fires

We have recieved the following e-mail from Gordon Birch of Rotary Club of Eltham, our Australian Aquabox champions.  I think it is self explanatory.

Gordon has asked for more filters as soon as possible so we are proposing send 15  Aqua30's to help restock their supplies.

                              >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

                               >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

03/03/2009 Sri Lanka and Aquaboxes

We are preparing to ship a container to Sri Lanka in support of the families caught in the in fighting between the Government and Tamil Rebel forces.

This has proved to be very difficult because the customs officials are insisting on each and every box contents to be uniqueley indentified and a list of contents attached to each box.  With our modus operandi, this would be totally impractical.  We are still trying to get the consignee to get the restrictions lifted.

The customs will no capitulate so we are no longer trying to ship Aquaboxes into Sri Lanka. (30-03-09)

03/03/2009 Support for Children of Honduras

We have shipped a further 50 Aqua30's to Honduras in support of Children of Honduras.  They will be used to help give the isolated families scattered throughout the local hills save drinking water.

In support of the larger villages, three new Aqua Filter "Community" units will be shipped out at the same time.  We anticipate the Aqua Filter Community units will take over from where Aqua 30's have been been distributed over teh alst two years.  Especially in those villages where there is a long term need for potable water and where they Government has yet to sink a well.

We are actively working with Aqua Filter to help develop this new technology.

14/01/2009 Zimbabwe Situation Update. More Support Would be Appreciated.

The situation in Zimbabwe continues to deteriate. (Iain Young of RIBI has circulated Rotarians) but we need additional support to help fund more Aqua30's. Our last 120 Aqua 30's and 80 Standards, cost us £40k; all met out of your kind donations.

Having finally found a route in, with more support, we could ship in more.

UN NEWS REPORT 13 January 2009

  OVER 2,000 LIVES NOW LOST TO ZIMBABWE’S WORST EVER CHOLERA OUTBREAK    The death toll in Zimbabwe’s worst ever cholera outbreak has now topped 2,000 , with more than 100 deaths – and nearly 1,500 new cases – added just today , the United Nations World Health Organization (WHO) reported. In all, there have been close to 40,000 cholera cases reported in Zimbabwe so far, according to WHO, which adds that virtually no part of the country has been spared in the epidemic, made worse by a near collapse of the health system and deteriorating humanitarian conditions. The disease, which is caused by contaminated food or water, has affected all ten of Zimbabwe’s provinces, and nearly 90 per cent of the country’s 62 local districts. Half the cases are in the capital, Harare, and only a handful of professionals are staffing clinics where several dozen are needed. WHO and sister agencies, such the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), have been scaling up their efforts to respond to the outbreak, including through the delivery of vital medical supplies.

09/01/2009 Zimbawe: 100 Aqua30's on route to hospitals

We are air freighting 100 Aqua30's, enough to clarify 3,330,000 litres of water, to Harare, Zimbawe, with the help of Muslim Aid and UMCO (United Methodits Commitee on Releif) who will distribute them for us.  We are supportingg the Methodist Hospitals in Nyadire and Mutambara; see below:-

United Methodist Committee of Relief: “UMCOR”

UMCOR is also working with the Western Pennsylvania Annual Conference to rebuild and rehabilitate water services and equipment for Nyadire Hospital and surrounding areas. Poor water quality and sanitation facilities are the main causes of cholera. This project will greatly improve the health and quality of life for those living in the Nyadire area - approximately 500,000 people.

UMCOR is shoring up the United Methodist hospitals to enable them to better cope with the worsening health situation in Zimbabwe and the cholera crisis in particular. Special cholera kits are en route to Nyadire and Mutambara that will allow the hospitals to effectively treat 2,600 people sick with the treatable but deadly illness.

04/01/2009 Zimbabwe Update

We have been trying to co-oordinate through Oxfam, MSF, Red Cross et al.  After some initial encouraging signs, basically the water purification requirement is now well covered by UNICEF:-   (Postcript: this is not 100% true, even if available over the whole country, UNICEF's partners are expecting the local people to BUY the tablets and, not surprisngly, many cannot afford to do so.  Hence our support via UMCOR above)

03 January  2009

  Dear Iain (Iain Young; Past District Governor 2003/04, Rotary International District 1010, Scotland North, and RIBI International Disaster  Co-ordinator)

  Over the past few weeks I have been in constant communication with several of the major aid agencies in order to get aid to the people of Zimbabwe and Oxfam have been the most responsive. However, as you will see from the attached, that despite initially accepting our offer of Aquaboxes, even they now do not require water treatment aid for Zimbabwe. The reason is that UNICEF, who are leading the joint agency effort, have already supplied:-

 1> water treatment chemicals and instructions in the local language for all urban areas for the next 4 months

 2>   tablets for 3.5 million people

 3> 470,000 litres of fresh water per day

 4>  4 million tablets for public water supplies

  5> 1 million tablets for households 

  Whilst Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) are yet to contact me following the Christmas break, it would appear that the water supply problem in Zimbabwe is under control at a level beyond both Aquabox and Lifestraw and that there would seem to no further point in us pursuing this further.

  Yours in Rotary,   Keith Meikle Janney ( Aquabox Distribution Co-ordinator)

We will still endevour to see if whether there is a need for Standard Aquaboxes.

16/12/2008 Aquaboxes into Zimbabwe

Feed The Children requested 80 Standard Aquaboxes and 20 Aqua30's at very short notice to day. 

We are pleased to be able to report that the 100 Aquaboxes are on route to Zimbabwe as of today.

14/12/2008 Zimbabwe Cholera

We are looking always to get Aqua30's into Zimbabwe. The major agencies of Red Cross/Red Cresent, Oxfam and Medicines Sans Frontiere all have their own way of working and as a general rule, rarely help us.   One of the routes that we are presently exploring is to get support from the local Rotarians but of course local money is a premium and President Mugabe does not look kindly on any form of external support and Bristish support in particular.  The probability of success is not high.

We continue to try.

14/12/2008 Eritria Shipment to Help Oroma Refugees from Etheopia

We have been asked by CART to help the Orama refugees in Eritrea  who have been displaced from their homelands in Ethiopia.  We are sending 200 Standard Aquaboxes in support of CART's work.

Eritrea

Eritrea is also one of the host countries in the Horn for Oromo nationals who were forced to leave their country of origin because of the present brutal and repressive regime of Ethiopia. Especially, the first Oromo refugees originally fled to Eritrea from forceful repatriation from Djibouti to Ethiopia managed to cross the Eritrean border and reached Asseb, Eritrea in July 2003. ORA worked closely with the officials of the Eritrean government in the area to provide them with food, water and other basic necessities, managed to assist them with health care services and clothes, and in particular provided satisfactory services for some mothers during their confinement.

14/12/2008 Decemeber Update

Democratic Republic of Congo and Goma district.

We have been frustarted over getting Aquaboxes into Goma in that Goma is over 1000 miles as the crow flies from the capital  city of Kinshasa.  The roads are mainly dirt roads and we have so far been unable to find a co-operating agency to handle the internal handling through customs and onward distribution.

Pakistan Floods

We have had similar problems over Pakinstan where any link with India limits our ability to serve.

11/11/2008 Aquabox Update; Aquaboxes to go to Pakistan and Probably to Goma ( DR Congo)

We are finalising shipping details to send boxes to Pakistan, (Recent Eearthquake victims where 68,000 people have been displaced and 7600 house destroyed)

We are also actively working on sending  Aquaboxes into Goma, DR Congo :- where ... weeks of violence have forced more than 250,000 people from homes or ramshackle camps where they had taken shelter, bringing to over 1 million the number of internal refugees from years of fighting in Democratic Republic of Congo's North Kivu province.

Most are children.

"North Kivu is quite possibly the worst place to be a child. There is no question that children have been the most severely affected by the recent conflict," said George Graham, spokesman for Save the Children in the provincial capital, Goma.

27/10/2008 Aquaboxes on route to Gambian Flood Victims

Aquabox is sending a container of Aquaboxes into the Southern inland part of the Gambia boarding on what is known as the Casamance.  The Casamance is the Southern region of Senegal that sits South of the Gambia  and is largely separated from the rest of Senegal by The Gambia.  Casamance people have tried to separate from (Northern) Senegal for very many years.

There has therefore been a very long on going conflict between the Casamance people and the Sengalese army with  many ad hoc conflicts and scurmishes.  This has been exacerbated by recent flooding in an already very wet part of Africa.

Our aid will be distributed to the recent flood victims around Sinchu Balia, (situated about 30 km from Banjul) together with some being distributed to a number of long standing Casamance refugee camps where the people are reported to be currently living in dire conditions. Together with other Gambian communities that use the river water as their primary source of drinking water.  It is also our intention to distribute some Aqua30's to the Health Centres and Schools around the area.

08/10/2008 Further Aquaboxes Shipped to Irrrawaddy Delta

A full container of Aquaboxes have been shipped to Myanamar for distribution within the Irrawaddy Delta.  Our shipement due to arrive in Yangon harbour today; 09 October 2008. 

Once cleared, they will be distributed to the victims of the floods in the Irawaddy delta.

30/08/2008 Aquaboxes to Bihar Northen India where 55++ killed and 2 million people displaced

We were planning to airfreight 100 aqua 30's togther with 100 or so Standard Aquaboxes to the  Bihar (Northern India) flood victims where at least 50 have been reported killed and 2 million people displaced due to the bursting of the banks of river.

But the Indian Government will not let any aid for the victims tax free.  We await developments. Logistical details, not a problem.

09/08/2008 Container of Aquaboxes to Irrawaddy Delta, Myanmar/Burma, Planned.

A further shipment of Aquaboxes to the Irrawaddy Delta is in the planning. 

We are awaiting consignee details.

Consignee details have finally come through. (29/08/08). And the ship leaves UK on 15th September.

09/08/2008 Aquaboxes on route to Moldova Flood Victims

Aquabox has sent 100 boxes to with Feed THE Children to Moldova to help aliviate the problems of last week's catastrophic flash flood. 

...............................................................................................................

Group urges aid for Ukraine, Moldova flood victims

Aug 07 2008, 11:54

 About 60,000 flood victims in Ukraine and Moldova urgently need food and clean water, the international Red Cross said Wednesday.

Heavy rains and floods two weeks ago left more than 30 people dead, dozens missing and forced 30,000 to flee their homes in the two eastern European countries, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said.

"These are the worst floods in two centuries," said Joe Lowry, the agency's representative for the region.

"People are in desperate straits, food is urgently needed as well as clean water. Many people have lost crops, gardens, livestock, poultry as well as their food reserves."

In western Ukraine, some 40,000 houses were flooded, and more than 30,000 hectares (74,000 acres) of croplands and nearly 700 kilometres of roads were severely damaged, the federation said.

Large tracts of farmland in neighbouring Moldova have also been submerged.

"Moldova is still recovering from a succession of serious droughts," Lowry said. "This is the worst possible irony for Europe's poorest country."

...................................................................................................................................

01/08/2008 China Sends a "Thank You" Certificate

It is gratifying to recieve a certificate from the China Charity Federation, all mounted in a spendid red folder, expressing appreciation for help given by Aquabox to China after their recent disaster.

Thank you, Chinq Charity Federation.

Palestinian Refugee Camp Visit Safely Accomplished

Daran Jones, our Coventry University Student, returned safely from Beirut, Lebanon, last weekend.  He found conditions worse than he expected with a refugee camp that was established in 1948 but had been bombed by local militants about a year ago and many families were left having to live in what is best described as very limited accomadation, up sixteen people in the space equivalent to no more than a garage; ~20m ² say!

Hygiene is a problem when living in such close quarters. Daran was also shown around another refugee camp and an orphanage while waiting for customs clearance.

There was said to be  water problem in the camp where the water is brought in by bowser and was said to be chlorinated.  On testing the water, Daran found that there was no trace of residual chlorine!  This could be cause of the reported high level of diarrhoea and premature deaths. 

Daran's Report

11/07/2008 Feedback from China on Aquabox Distribution

Our Rotarian contact in China, Mr Willa Wang, reports that our Aquaboxes have been distributed to victims of Mian Yang City of Sichuan Province by the China Charity Federation (CCF).

The distribution has been listed on Ministry of Civil Affaire's official web site of June  23rd.  (Only available in Chinese. MSN上小游戏，工作休闲两不误！ 马上就开始玩！ )

Willa also reports that the CCF would like to appreciate the generous aid from Aquabox, and that ..... "the relief items in each box were qiuite useful and practical, and they were impressed by the concept of one box dedicated for one family use, saying thay would use it as an example for their future relief disaster work."

An Official Acknowledgement Certificate will be issued by the CCF for our gift of Aquaboxes.  This will follow on later.

30/06/2008 Coventry University Student's Work-Based-roject is to Study Aquabox

We are working with Coventry University- Emergency and Disaster Mangement  Faculty and as a result, we have Daran Jones carrying out a Work-Based-Project that will look at various aspects of the Aquabox operation during the three months of the summer vacation.

One of his key tasks is for him to follow up the distribution of Aquaboxes around the world.  To this end, he will be following up our Aquabox shipments to Lebanon - Palestian Refugee Camp of 28,000 or so with a drinking water problem.  Yams Farm in eastern Freetown, Sierra Leone; a new small community of 6,500 who children are said to be dying of diarrhoea.  And Lastly, through HIMS (Hamsworth International Missionary Society) who have distributed Aquaboxes over the years within Sierra Leone; some into western Freetown and others distributed wider afield. The first two sites have not had Aquaboxes before.

It has not been possible to encompass the distribution of Aquaboxes into Burma and China due to fairly obvious logistical problems.  These are the  "natural" disasters while the others Daran is following up are are largely the longer term, if not very long term,  "man-made" disasters. 

We look forward to Daran's report with interest.

30/06/2008 Aquaboxes for Yams Farm

PRIMED, ( Promoting Initiatives for Micro- Enterprise Development), have  requested some Aquaboxes for their small Yams Farm settlement of 6,500 displaced people on the eastern fringe of Freetown, Sierra Leone.  They have a particular problem of contaminated water in this community so that many children die of diarrhoea.  This is reflected in there being only 2000 children in a community of 2,500 women.

 PRIMED had access to about 500 Aquaboxes or so with the co-operation of HIMS back in 2002-2003 and these Aquaboxes were distributed to eight small communities that PRIMED were working with at the time.  Shirlene Carew, a Trustee, contacted us via our website and we have decided to support her initiatives by meeting her request.  Our Coventry University student, Daran Jones, who is carrying out a Work Based Project with Aquabox during the next two months or so of the summer vacation, will be overseeing their distribution in Eastern Freetown.

 PRIMED is basically major on Micro Finance initiatives where small loans are made to the local women to give them a chance to become self sufficient.

20/06/2008 Aquaboxes to Palestinian Refugees

526 Aquaboxes were loaded to day on route by sea to a Palestinian refugee camp in North Lebanon. The distribution of tthe Aquaboxes will be handled by the local associate of Mulsim Aid (London).  ( see www.muslimaid.org)

Roughly 28,000 "Gaza Strip" Palestininas are presently resident in the refugee camp.  They do not have potable water  This is the first distribution made possible with the support of Muslim Aid.

17/06/2008 Aquabox (Australia) give Aquabox30 help to Burmese Hospitals

A note from Aquabox Australia (Rotary Club of Eltham).

Dear David I thought I would give you an update on our efforts to get Aquaboxes into Burma.

We sent 4 Aquabox 30's together with 4 Rotarians that were going there to help at the local hospitals - they already had contacts with these hospitals. We hear today that 2 boxes are in the Yangan children's hospital and 2 are in the Yangan free hospital (this hospital deals with all the very under privileged local residents). We have photos showing these being used , I am sure your instructions in Burmanese (sent from Aquabox UK) will have helped.

The reports we have indicated that more filters and tablets will be required very soon, we are not sure how we are going to get them to the hospitals now the Rotarians have returned , but I am sure we will find a way . Apparently the water is being used both for drinking as well as for surgical purposes.

Regards Gordon Birch (Rotary Club of Eltham)

Richard Lawrence of the Rotary Club of Essendon in the Yangan Free Hospital with the Eltham Aquabox.

12/06/2008 Aquabox thanks all supporters: Especially the Vale of Belvoir Ironstone Villages Family of Churches

Aquabox Committe wish to thank evrrybody who has contributed over the last six weeks or so.  It has enabled us to continue to search for ways into both Burma and China.

Our support has come in many ways, not least from the Ironstone Villages Family of Churches  in Vale of Belvoir who last night came with a cheque for £600 and packed twenty boxes with items that they had collected together.  This was prompted by the daughter of a Rotarian Brian Sollitt of Rotary Club of Melton Mowbray Belvoir, who spotted an Aquabox in her father's  home and thought what a good idea an ideal basis for a church "Cell Group" project.   Her Cell Group raised the £640 and collated the contents, all within a two weeks.  Their boxes are now on the way to Burma.

So rather like the parable of five loaves and two fishes, one lonely Aquabox grew into twenty one Aquaboxes; all within a couple of weeks!

We could do with some more miracles from whatever faith or denomination to help us to help those in need.

Heidi Edmunds and Rosemary Griffiths in tthe Cromford Depot packing their twenty Aquaboxes:-

12/06/2008 Aquaboxes flown into China

We have just securred a consignee in China and have airfreighted 200 Standards out to the China Charity Federation (CCF) for onward distribution. 

We have not sent Aqua30's this time because this is a humanitarian disaster and as such water purification is reported not to be a major priority.  Of course the water infrastruture was damaged but not irretrievably so.

12/06/2008 More Aid to Burma

We have air freighted a further 100 boxes into Burma making 140 Aqua30's and 260 Standards.  (Value of our support to Burma: about £70,000).

This second batch have gone out with Humanity First and will meet up with their medical team in Rangoon.  Humanity First have just recieved authority to send their team out into the Irrawaddy Delta.

06/06/2008 China and Burma Update

We have been endevouring to get a container load of Standards into China but are having difficulty in finding an in-country assignee to handle the distribution.  In short, there is not a water problem in China and so Aqubaxes as a "water aid" item is not seen as a priority.  But we are trying to sell the idea that we wish to give Aquaboxes to China for their humanitarian aid content to be given to the displaced families and there are plenty of those.

Burma is still an unknown quantity and, having got our 300 boxes into Vangon Airport  and handed over the appropraite ministry by the first of June, there is probably little more we can do.

We are in a position where we are looking to ship out on one or two fronts out of four: China, Burma, Lebanon (Palestinian Refugee Camp) and Africa (general).

25/05/2008 Loughborough High School Help Burma Disaster

Loughborough High School has responded to the recent Burma Cyclone disaster and Chinese earthquake appeal by working with Rotary International to fill 25 Aquaboxes. 

Each form in the school received an empty box and the girls were encouraged by the charity representatives to provide the items for each box.  All the school rose to the challenge (including the staff) by completing the boxes within just one week.

.

24/05/2008 Burma; 24th May; 300 Aquaboxes in the air to Vangon

120 Aqua30's and 180 Standard Aquaboxes finally left Cromford on Friday 23rd May on route to Vangon Airport.  They have been addressed to the Junta and the Junta have replied accepating our gift.  The boxes should be in Vangon by no later than the 1st June and hopefully earlier.  This shipment constitutes over £50,000 of aid with the airfreight included.

The Aqua30's have the capability of processing ~ 4 million litres of water (4000 tonnes) and enough for 3.3million people-days at 1.5 litres be day.  The Aquaboxes will help 180 families to start the lives again.

We will now review to see what else is possible.

You continued support is appreciated by not only us, but also very more so by the victims of these disasters.

22/05/2008 Rangoon Port Closed Indefinitely, Back to Airfreight

We have at last secured a flight-in which leaves UK on Monday next for Bangkok and flying on to Burma at the latest 1st June or earlier if a flight becomes available. We are sending 180 of our Aqua 30 boxes which will provide water for 27000 people for 110 days and 120 of our standard Aquaboxes which will provide132000  litres of water together with essential humanitarian aid.

Due to the absence of aid agencies at Yongon (Rangoon) we have been obliged to consign the load to The Deputy Minister, The Ministry of Social Welfare and Relief. Whilst this is not preferred, at least it gets the aid to the people who desperately in need of it.

Please note that the comprehensive instructions for use of the boxes have been translated into Burmese and are attached to each of the boxes.

Fingers crossed again.

20/05/2008 Burma; Air Freight Route Abandoned, Container into Rangoon asap

After all the "nearly there" routes to be confirmed and the recent message that our flight had to be cancelled due to the Bangkok Airport warehouse was full, we have decided to send a container of Aquaboxes by sea in a 40 foot container as soon as practical. The Aquaboxes will be left on pallets for ease of onward shipment with each box and pallet labelled with a short description in Burmese of their contents and intended use.  This means that we can ship about 500 boxes this way.  They will be addressed to the Junta's recomended Minister as this is the only way in at the present

We will be looking to sending a second container into Burma or maybe into China, if thought more appropriate to do so, as soon as a second container load is availble. 

Fingers crossed on their quick distribution to those in need.

16/05/2008 Burma; Monday 19th Flight out with 300 Aquaboxes Cancelled; Warehouse Full

We were about to ship 150 Aqua30's plus 150 Standards but the warehouse in Vangon is full.  So the flight has been aborted and we have to go into "holding"  mode again. 

 We will still be attaching Instructions in Burmese  to be  to each and every individual box during the weekend in anticipation of the next window of opportunity.    We hope this is a sign that routes in will begin to open up.

Once shipped, we will need to restock the Aqua30's as fast as possible.

16/05/2008 Aquabox Update, We are awaiting a commercial flight out of Heathrow

Aquabox have had Aquaboxes available from stock from day one and one needs an in-country consignee to accept the goods.  We soon found an in-country  consignee in Burma from teh lsit of NGO's we have already worked with.  But getting a commercial flight has proved to be very difficult because very little traffic flies in Vangon and the Junta have not been co-operative.  An understatement to say the least.  We have been waiting to get flight details out of Heathrow for at least a week.

Aquabox continues to explore whatever is possible to get your boxes into Burma.

13/05/2008 URGENT CALL TO RETURN AQUABOXES

We will be airfreighting first batch of Aquaboxes into Rangoon.

We need Aquaboxes returned as soon as possible so we can follow up with container load of more boxes into Burma.

There must be a thousand or two Aquaboxes out there waiting to be addressed.  Please look to filling them with humanitarian list of items as suggested and returning them so we can help the unfortunate victims in Burma.

Route into Burma Offered

We have just heard that one of our muslim based associates will accept our shipments.  We are still looking at other routes in as a contingency.

We plan to air freight 300 Aquaboxes in immediately (100 Aqua 30's).  Followed up by as many additional loads by sea that we can muster.

07/05/2008 Aquabox Ready to ship Aquaboxes to Burma

In response the latest Nargis cyclone damage in Myarmar (the country we in the UK knew better as Burma), we, Aquabox, have immediately earmarked  ~120 Aqua30's and up to 300 Aquabox Golds/Standards for availability to be flown out to Burma-Rangoon as soon as we can find an in-country agent to help clear customs and oversee distribution.  It looks as if it could be difficult but we do have one or two irons in the fire.  We await feedback from our initial discussions.

We have ordered and additional batch of 300 off sets of Aquabox Gold components so we can accelerate the packing of Golds once we have confirmation of a route in.

After the first air freighted batch, we hope to be able to follow this up with further seaborne container load(s) of Aquaboxes for as long as it takes.

Please continue to support us, every little bit helps  .. to alleviate suffering on the front line of these major natural disasters.  It is your "Gift of Life." 

12/04/2008 CALL FOR HELP: District International Chairmen and your District Conferences

Dear District International Chairman,

AQUABOX has introduced a new box called Aquabox Gold, and you will have received details of this at the RIBI Assembly in Birmingham.   We now want to make all Clubs aware of this and would like to attend as many District Conferences as possible.   However, we do make every effort to keep our overheads low and only have one part-time administrator, therefore the Club members spend most of their time filling and despatching boxes and do not have the time to attend all the Conferences. And of course, without the continuing support from Rotarians, we cannot distribute Aquaboxes to those in need.

This is where we need your help!   Could you encourage one or more Rotarians in your District to oversee and man an AQUABOX stand at your annual Conference?   We would provide all that was necessary, i.e. AQUABOX Demonstration unit, sample of an AQUABOX GOLD, brochures, display boards etc.

  If your district can help, please contact AQUABOX through the website www.aquabox.org or call the Help Line on 01629 825178.

  Thanking you in anticipation of your support.

  Aquabox

12/04/2008 Aquabox Asks for Your Support

Aquabox   can only distribute water and humanitarian aid to those in need with your on-going support.   We need both your help and support to maintain our ability to offer this ”Gift of life” around the world.

  In the last eighteen months or so, we at Aquabox have been trying to recover from the impact of the Tsunami and reposition ourselves where the original paradigm that had proved to be so successful for the first twelve years or so, was shown to have a significant time lag in it when asked to be scaled up quickly.   In spite of this, with your help we did achieved a four fold scale up in our 2005 shipments, albeit we felt we were still left a little wanting since our philosophy relied 100% on our Standard Aquaboxes being physically filled with humanitarian aid through the goodwill of you, your friends and your community on a one-by-one basis.  

  With 20,000 boxes being distributed in 2005, this began to sap the energy of some of you, our VIP supporters; one Aquabox for every three RIBI members. So after this supreme effort, the physical filling of Standard Aquaboxes not unexpectedly waned a little in 2006.  To overcome this problem, we have introduced Aquabox   Gold whereby we offer to pack the Standard Aquaboxes in our depot in Cromford with new humanitarian aid items that we purchase direct from a number of wholesalers.   Any short term increase in demand is now under our direct control, subject to sufficient funding being in place and to there being adequate supplies being available in the pipeline to the wholesalers. We have also replaced our video by a new 13 minute DVD, updated our website, introduced our Inform ation Pack, redesigned a new pamphlet and now have banners to go with the Demonstration units.

  Aquabox is often asked to take a stand in the various RIBI District Conferences “House of Friendships.” We have had to turn a number down because it is not possible to find enough Rotary Club of Wirksworth volunteers for all 29 districts plus of course the RIBI Conference, year-in and year-out.   In order to tackle this problem, we would like to invite you, through your particular District International Committee Chairman, to man an Aquabox stand at your own District Conference on behalf of Aquabox and more especially on behalf of those in need of a gift of life.     

  We would offer the basis of a stand in sending you appropriate publicity materials in the form of banners, demonstration kits, DVD and other publicity materials, and possibly an Aquabox Gold as well, if you for your part would put together a team to man the stands over the particular conference weekend.   

  We would like to ask all twenty nine District International Chairman to consider gathering together a small group of volunteers from within your District who would be prepared to cover an Aquabox stand in your own District Conference’s “House of Friendship.”   Please consider this proposal and we would greatly appreciate you coming back to advise us of your ability to help.

On behalf of the Aquabox Committee please contact: enquiries@aquabox.org  01629825178

12/04/2008 New Milestone: 100% Acceptance of Standard Aquaboxes: No rejects

The weekly returns of Aquaboxes this morning was a "first" in that all 31 of the boxes were correctly packed, within their polythene packing bags, included a bucket, largely followed the new recomemended packing list and weighed in at around 25kgs, the top weight.

This is a genuine first.  We normally have a need to reject 5% to 10% with up to 50% on a really bad day when schools return them at the end of term/end of year, all of which need repacking before being sent out. 

This means that we can concentrate on making up Aquabox Golds this week.

Thanks to all you who have taken note of our gentle evolution towards more general purpose humanitarian items and a call for less clothes (in-fill only).

12/04/2008 New Web Site has 40,000 hits in its first year

Our "new" Aquabox Website went live in March of 2007.  Within this first year, just over 40,000 hits were recorded.  Thank you all for keeping informed of our progress via our website.

Aquabox Team; Thanks All Our Supporters

AQUABOX would like to thank RIBI for their continued support.   Without your support, Aquabox would not be able to even begin to reach those most in need of our help.

  Since the hectic days of 2005 following the Tsunami, we have had to retrench and regroup in more ways than one.   Not least because, after nine years of managing the Aquabox project, Rtn. Frank Lund finally handed over the reins to others just a tad younger.  

  One of the more obvious changes has been the updating of the web site.   We now have all modern facilities, in particular, on-line editing and updating of our shipments. The site has had just over 40,000 hits in the first year of going live which hopefully indicates the level of interest and support we have.

  We updated the brochure so that we now have an Information Pack with six flyers. The new Information Pack may look a little “posh” for Aquabox but it does have all the information you need and print run costs are surprisingly low. There is also a single sheet pamphlet plus a new, 13 minute video.   The video is available at a nominal charge.   Please take on board that we really do need to both regularly and formally “sell” a few items so that we can legitimately reclaim VAT on all our outgoings.   With this in mind, we also have “iron-on” badges for sweat shirts etc. at a very reasonable cost!

  We continue to offer Aquabox Demonstration Units on loan to support your local fundraising.   These units are also for sale at a nominal cost. We also have available two self supporting pull up 2m x 0.75m banners and a new table banner to compliment the demonstration kits.

  Some of our supporters have indicated a preference not to fill the boxes with aid but to purchase boxes already filled.   Taking the lead from Chelwood Bridge, District 1200, we introduced Aquabox Gold, a product where we buy in approximately 60 separate items direct from wholesalers or importers and fill the box with this aid on your behalf.   We also supply two filter packs to double the capacity of purifying water.   So far we have packed 1500 Aquabox Gold’s in our Cromford depot over the last nine months, which is in addition to repacking the normal 10% to 20% of boxes that come back either poorly packed or only part filled.  

  Over the last month, we have had specific support from you for Aquaboxes to be sent to Bangladesh.   In order to be able to respond as quickly as possible, we have so far air freighted 450 boxes in tandem with “Humanity First’s” own aid.   Humanity First sent out their own medical teams to the front line just ahead of the freight leaving Heathrow.   Our Aquaboxes have been distributed locally around the medical team’s field hospital.

The Aquabox team would like to say a big thank you to each and every one of you and we hope your support of Aquabox will continue over the coming years since, unfortunately, the potential demand for Aquaboxes throughout the world continues to increase.   There are also many people outside Rotary, especially many members of our local community who give their time week after week supporting Aquabox and this is also very much appreciated.

  The Aquabox Committee.                                          A Gift of Life

21/03/2008 Aquabox Number 70,000 on route to help Albanian Blast Victims

The Rotary Club of Ravenshead recently packed Aquabox Standard box number 70,000.  This box was packed by Bob Jackson and his team and will be  driven in convoy by Nottingham Police Aid team to to Albania to help those who suffered the effects of the recent ammunition dump explosion where several people were killed and 500 or so families were made homeless.

The Nottingham Police Aid group send a team out to a Albania every year and had not planned to request any Aquboxes this year.  Under the new circumstances, David Scott of Notts Police Aid said that he felt that it would be most appropriate to send Aquaboxes after all to help those in the Tirania District who had lost their homes in the explosion.

"One hundred and sixty people are feared dead or injured after a series of large explosions at an army base on the outskirts of Tirana, the capital of Albania, officials have said.

People suffering with burns, concussions and broken limbs were rushed to local hospitals following the blasts, believed to have begun while teams were dismantling munitions at a store base. Many of the injuries were a result of flying glass or shrapnel.

A Reuters cameraman who quickly arrived at the scene described people trying to escape: "Terrified people are leaving the area on foot along the highway, women and children. Cars with broken windows have been abandoned on the highway."

The force of the explosion was so strong that it was felt at the seaside resort of Durres, 20km away. People living in the nearby village of Gerdec took shelter in concrete bunkers while others fled to the hills."

(Further story and pictures to come as Aquabox No 70,000 travels to Albania)

18/03/2008 Aquabox Wins Oscar for "Outstanding Contribution to Rotary 2007-2008"

The Rotary Club of Long Eaton Dawnbreakers instigated an Oscars Award ceremony at their First Charter Anniversary  on Saturday 16th February.

After the introductory series of Oscars covering such awards as the "Best Dressed Female to Impress Male at Charter " and "Best Dressed Male to Impress Female at Charter," the sixth and final Oscar was awarded to AQUABOX and the Rotary Club of Wirksworth for "Outstanding Contribution to Rotary 2007/2008."  

David Haspel of the Rotary Club of Wirksworth recieved the award on behalf of everybody involved and more especially, on behalf of all our supporters without whose support there would be no Aquaboxes to distribute to those in a very real need of both a "gift of water" as well as humanitarian aid.  (Photo awaited). 

28/02/2008 Bretby Rotarians take Aquaboxes into Local School

Bob and Pauline Wood of Bretby Rotary visited the Aquabox depot and then took two boxes into their local school.

The initial pictures show Aquabox Golds packing area and Aquabox depot stocks.

The pictures below Bob and Pauline  presenting two Aquabox to the school children

18/02/2008 Shipments Pass 400,000,000 litres of Potentially Potable Water

The latest batch of 80 Aquaboxes to Angola, via "Feed the Children" takes us past the next 100,000,000 litres benchmark of  400,000,000 litres of potable water,  400,000 tonnes of drinking water, or 0.4 of a cubic kilometer (400m x 100m x 1000m).

We have also just processed Standard Aquabox Number 70,000.  The story of its journey is  on its way.

25/01/2008 Belper School Students Support Aquabox

Belper School (Derbyshire) has supported our Aquabox project for several years now by sponsoring and filling standard boxes.

The photo shows, Rotarians David Harris And Peter James of Duffield and Belper Rotary Club who gave this years presentation to a group of supporting children.

21/01/2008 Aquaboxes to Malawi Flood Victims

Malawians have already been
suffering from severe drought

Flash floods in southern Malawi have displaced more than 40,000 people and killed one person when his car was washed away by the rising waters.

Houses, livestock and crops of farming families had been swept away in the Lower Shire Valley, a local district commissioner said.

Some 5m Malawians are already facing food shortages after the worst drought in more than a decade. The floods have cut off communication with other villages in the area due to poor roads raising fears that the number of affected people could be much higher, our correspondent says.

Malawi's Meteorological Department has warned that people living in low-lying areas throughout Malawi should brace for more flooding because heavy rains will continue to fall in the coming weeks.

18/01/2008 Aquaboxes Distributed in Indonesia

On Decemeber 10th, the Langsa district of Northern Sumatra suffered suffered from  major coastal erosion due to exceptionally high tides combined with strong winds and roigh seas. 83 families and 700 people were displaced.  30 Aquaboxes were distributed out of Medan by the Leuser International Foundation (LIF).  On December 5th, flooding temporarily displaced more than 20 villages (1000's of people) in Eastern Aceh. When the flooding had subsided sufficiently, LIF sent a further 20 Aquaboxes together with food and medical supplies.

LIF distrbuted over 7000 boxes in the year of the Tsunami in and around Aceh.  The sent Aquaboxes to the victims of the Nias Island earthquake and the earthquake in Jogaharta on Java that resulting in major mud slides.  They also sent Aquaboxes to flood victims in Aceh  district last year.

LIF hold stocks of Aquaboxes in Medan on our behalf and they in turn have distributed them around the Northern half of the Island (Aceh distrct) as well as to neigbouring islands and as far as Java.

We are looking to topping up their main stockpilke in Medan, Northern Sumatra.

Pictures of the recent floods and stockpile in Medan.

LIF Report January 2008

17/01/2008 Sister Abbott from Romania thanks to West Ashfield Inner Wheel Members

We recieved this "Thank you" message through Phil Shorthouse of Blythewood Care:-

"On behalf of the young people who live at Casa Lumina in Comanesti, Romania I should be grateful if you would pass on much-appreciated thanks for the 'Aquabox' that had been donated by the Inner Wheel Club of West Ashfield and was delivered to us via Blythswood Care following severe flooding in July 2005.  Apologies for the length of time it has taken to write, but I have only just noticed the Inner Wheel West Ashfield label on the side of the box today.

As a result of those awful floods in the town, 58 houses dissappeared and 85 were destroyed.  The entire town was without mains water for three weeks and we had to collect supplies from a natural spring some miles away.  If you'd like to get in touch with me, I'd be happy to provide you with more details about the residential home in which I am Care Manager for the 23 very special, Special Needs previously abandoned youngsters who live here.

By the way, the Aquabox is still very much a useful piece of equipment here - we use it for storage of food supplies.

Many thanks and God Bless,    Sister Elizebeth Abott

                                               Casa Lumina, Comanesti, Romania 

                                                17-Jan-2008

03/01/2008 A Few Pictures; Bangladesh and the Solomon Islands

The following picture shows Aquaboxes being shipped upriver in  Bangladesh

Boxes on route to Gizo, re Solomon Island Tsunami

03/01/2008 TRAFALGAR SCHOOL'S CHRISTMAS BOXES HELP TO SAVE LIVES

  Pupils of Downton's Trafalgar School have combined two projects by making their efforts to support the Salisbury Rotary Club's emergency Aquabox scheme into part of their Duke of Edinburgh's Award programme.

Aquaboxes provide clean filtered water for the victims of natural disasters such as earthquakes.  Besides water-purification filters, the boxes also contain other vital survival items such as cooking utensils, tools, torches an baby-clothes.  Each box is designed to support a family of four.  Having decided to support the Rotary appeal, the school council voted to donate £2000 - proceeds from the school's annual sponsored walk to the scheme.  Half was paid into Rotary's Aquabox Fund and was used to purchase four filters each capable of purifying 33000 litres of water. The rest was spent on filling Aquaboxes.

  "Filling them required a lot of effort," explained the supervising teacher Beverley Pugh.  "The pupils had to work from a limited budget and negotiate with local stores to purchase the items needed.  When they knew it was for charity, some of the shops gave very generous discounts.  So making this support part of the Duke of Edinburgh's Award scheme meant we met the criteria of  improving organisational and budgeting skills whilst at the same time  helping people."

  "I think it has been a marvellous effort by Trafalgar," said Salisbury Rotary Club International committee chairman Frances Wain.  "We now have five local schools supporting the Aquabox scheme, and next year I hope even more will join in.  And it is not just a token effort.  We know where each box is sent, and we know that they really do help to save lives."  

    Photo shows:  Trafalgar School pupils filling Rotary Aquaboxes.  

 Back row:   Craig Ball, Jess Lawrence,  Leanne Street,  Millie Byrne, Kerry Middleton, Meggie Shipton.

Front: row :   Caelin Reid,  Jade Connolly,  Ellie Greenway,  Ben James,  Sophie Middleton and Amy Shipton.

Photo arranged by school, all parental permissions obtained, all spelling checked and correct (including Meggie).     From Chris Wain, Rotary Club of Salisbury

12/12/2007 More Aquaboxes on route to Bangladesh

Humanity First's co-ordinator has just returned from Bangladesh and they have agreed to co-ordinate and oversee the distribution of a further 250 Standard Aquaboxes.  The shipment left Cromford on Tuesday 18th December; interim destination London Heathrow.

12/12/2007 District 1110 Fund 100 Aqua Golds for Bangladesh

District 1110, encompassing 75 Rotary Clubs, covering most of Hampshire, East Dorset, South Wiltshire, the Isle of Wight and the Channel Islands, Have kindly sent a cheque for £8,000 to cover the cost of 100 Aqua Golds.

Thank you District 1110.  They will be on route very shortly, see the posting above.

05/12/2007 Robert Smyth School, Market Harborough, chooses Aquabox as their 2007 Christmas Charity

The Robert Smyth School has chosen Aquabox as their Christmas Charity this year with a target of 60 boxes.  One from each Tutor Group.

They have been using sponsored silences (up to  five days!); probably pretty difficult for some.  And some of the boys the boys are being sponsored for having having their legs waxed.  See www.robertsmyth.leics.sch.uk/?cat=21

They have raised £1333 and completed the packing six boxes as of the 5th December.

Congratulations and we wish you a lots of fun while raising funds to support us in our endeavors. 

Thanks every one of you for being silent, being made hairless amongst very many other activities. 

Robert Smyth School Charity Notes

01/12/2007 Rotary Club of Canton , OHIO, Fund Aqua30 for Banladesh

The Rotary Club of Canton, OHIO, has kindly ordered an Aqua30 for Bangladesh  They paid by Pay Pal an ordered via the web . 

Thank you Canton Rotarians.

Aquabox Committee

20/11/2007 Aquaboxes On Route To Bangladesh

It has just been agreed to airfreight 200 Standard Aquaboxes (a mixture of Standards and Aquabox Golds) and 30 Aqua30's out this weekend to Dakar in support of Humanity First's medical team. ( www.humanityfirst.org.uk)

We supported Humanity First when they sent in their Medical Teams into Kashmir and we are doing the same again.  The boxes will be flown out of Heathrow on November 24th and will meet up with their medical team who are flying out on the day before on November 23rd.

The medical team will be using the Aqua30's in support of their field hospital and the team will also oversee the distribution of the Standards in the area surrounding their field hospital.

Since the boxes are being air freighted out, this will cost us about £25/box over and above our normal costs.  If you would like to support this initiative, then some support towards the extra cost of air freighting the boxes out to Bangladesh would be greatly appreciated.

04/11/2007 St Edwards and Orchard Schools, Castle Donnington, together with Diesworth and Long Whatton Schools help with Aquaboxes

Castle Donnington Rotary Club have been helped by St Edwards, Orchard, Diesworth and Long Whatton schools to fill four Aquaboxes.  These boxes were part of the shipment that has been sent by CART out to Africa and India.

05/10/2007 CART Sends Aquaboxes to Central African Flood Area

Christian African Relief Trust are sending 400 Standards and 50 Aqua30's out to help relieve the the effects of the recent floods across Central Africa.  The boxes are likley to end up in Uganda and/or Kenya.

As a result of tthe Aquabox Demonstration kit looking rather lonely next to the RIBI "Rotary Roadshow" trailer at the Bakewell Show this Summer (what summer you may say with some justification!).  We now have two "new" pull-up banners and a "new" table top banner specifically designed to address the more professional presentation aspects of our Demonstration Kits out in the field. 

These will be on view at the forthcoming District 1220 District Conference in Southport in October 2007 together with our standard Demonstration Kit, "new" Aquabox Gold, "new" Information Pack, "new" Pamphlet and "new" (13 minute) Aquabox DVD.

New Aquabox Pamphlet Available

We have just printed off the first batch new Aquabox Pamphlets ( A4 folded x3).  This has been designed by Neil Mudford of the Rotary Club of Mansfield and addresses the hands-on application side on our product.  He has also developed an additional PowerPoint presentation for use at conferences.  Those of you attending District 1220 Conference in Southport (October 2007) should be able to see both products of his endevours.

More Aquabox Demonstration Kits Available

We have just built our twentieth Aquabox Demostration kit.  We offer the units out on loan at £18 to cover the ParecelForce costs or they are available for sale at a very nominal  cost £120 each.  We can also offer battery powered packs for use where no mains power is available.

We have had over 50 calls for our Aquabox Demonstration Kits in the last two years and have "sold" eight units over the same period.

Please feel free to borrow/buy a demonstartion kit to support your fund raising activities. 

28/09/2007 Aquabox Web Site passes its second 10,000 hits milestone in just three months

The new Aquabox web site has continued to be accessed at an ever increasing rate.  It took just under six months to reach the "first" 10,000 hits since we launched the new web site back in January 2007.  It has taken just under three months reach "second" 10,000 hits milestone. And we thank you all for your interest in our activities.

I think we can reasonably assume that people are finding our new site helpful and informative.  Should you have any comments on it, please feel free to e-mail us through the website.

25/07/2007 Tewkesbury Floods; Rotary Clubs of Malvern and Gloucester to Co-ordinate Aquabox Distribution

We had a call from the President of the Rotary Club of Malvern checking the prospect of them receiving a number of Aquaboxes. They are this morning (25-07-07) collecting 30 boxes each with a filter and tablet set to produce 1100 litres of purified water for use in the more rural areas where distribution of bottled water may not be readily available.

Gloucester Rotary Club have brought forward the collection of their annual 100 Standard boxes that they will use locally in the short term and then return to Cromford filed with humanitarian aid as usual.

These boxes will, of course, be our help and gift from the Aquabox Project.

21/07/2007 Aquabox Responds to RIBI's -Rotary Today- letter from Gerry Needham, North Bournemouth.

Dear Sir/Madam

I read the letter from Gerry Needham (North Bournemouth R/C) in June 2007 "Rotary Today" and would like to respond on behalf of Aquabox.

First of all, we greatly appreciate the  R/C of North Bournemouth's regular support and yes, they are one of our more consistent and substantial supporters at 130 boxes per year.  In response to the December 2004 Tsunami, we shipped 20,000 boxes in 2005 and sustained shipping about 8000 in 2006 and are heading for a further 8000 in 2008.  This compares to a typical 3,500 to 5,000 Aquaboxes being shipped per year before the Tsunami.

We have not been idle over the last year or so, we have updated the website (www.aquabox.org) so that we can now write directly to it with stories, update the picture gallery as well as update the shipping fact sheet before the lorry has had time to reach their destination.  We now get over 2500 hits per month and growing.  We have a new 13 minute DVD and new Information Pack that contains six flyers.  We have recently sold ten "Demonstration Kits" to Clubs. Lastly, but not least, we have launched Aquabox Gold that enables us to pack Aquaboxes with new, bought in, humanitarian aid items that mean that we can respond quicker to disasters by bringing in extra packing teams.  These boxes contain two filter packs and have been priced at £80.00 each. The first 500 Aquabox Golds were completed by July 2007 and we expect the concept to take root.  Using this product should enable us to offer a quicker and more responsive support to those in need. 

We still need the support of Rotary Clubs, Inner Wheel and our other supporters to keep on filling and returning the Standard Aquaboxes.  This is still very much the backbone of the scheme and will remain so.  With all the new developments, we are also becoming more proactive with respect to shipping and looking for aid agencies who are prepared to stockpile our boxes in preparation for the almost inevitable next local disaster.  For example, we are working with the Leuser International Foundation in Northern Sumatra who hold up to 600 Aquaboxes on our behalf.

We are proud of Aquabox but of course the continued growth and an insatiable demand means that we need to involve an ever wider family of supporters since the scheme is by its very nature, is fairly labour intensive. We are of course pleased that we have this support from a wide range of groups within our local community. 

YIR David Haspel Aquabox Committee 

19/07/2007 Inner Wheel District 26 Packed 55 Standard Aquaboxes in 2006-2007

To "Aquabox Web Editor"

I thought you might like to know the final number of boxes from Inner Wheel District 26. We managed 55 boxes, which was pretty good when you realise that we also did 20 Shelterboxes. I am sure this will have a knock-on effect, and certainly more people outside Rotary/Inner Wheel know about it than before.

Best wishes

Sandra Maizels Past President; IW Distrct 26

We hope that you will consider this to be a new District 26 benchmark target for 2007-2008 Aquaboxes! (Web Editor)

Bemrose Community School (Derby) Visits Cromford to Deliver 18 Aquaboxes

At Bemrose Community School in Derby , back in January 2007 we were introduced to the Aquabox scheme.   Each of the 28 forms in the school then went off to plan a way to raise enough money to buy a supply of the lifesaving boxes.

Back in form rooms students researched the need for clean water and discussed fundraising ideas. Students were then encouraged to evaluate their ideas and choose the most appropriate methods of fundraising.

  Activities ranged from sponsored silences, film showings, raffles and craft stalls to a football tournament and a talent show.   

By Easter students had raised £1300 and bought 18 Aquaboxes.

Toni Barson, Citizenship Leader, brought the full boxes back on 10th July and was shown around the depot with two of the students.  Thank you for all your efforts, I know they will all be very greatly appreciated by the refugees in Sierra Leone.

Bemrose School Report

13/07/2007 First 500 Aquabox Golds Packed.

The first 500 of the new Aquabox Golds have been packed. The last 100-200 or so will be on route to Sierra Leone when KDDA picks up a full load at the end of July 2007.  They will be used to support the many thousands of families held in refugee camps in Sierra Leone. (Over 5,000,000 people in all).

                                           Aquabox Gold Packing in Cromford Depot

13/07/2007 Gizo (Solomon Islands) Tsunami: Aquaboxes arrive in Honiara

We have finally had a report back that our 400 Aquaboxes sent by air via DHL to Brisbane and onwards to Honiara under the auspices of District 9600 WCS Committee.  They arrived in June and 200 boxes have been disributed in Munda, Gizo and Choiseul via the Rotary Network. The last 200 are awaiting further distribution by small boat and canoes as this is the only affordable transport available to serve the outlying islands.

Pictures are awaited

10/06/2007 "New" Aquabox Web site passes first 10,000 hits inside six months

The "New" Aquabox web site continues to go from strength to strength with ever increasing numbers of visitors with over 10,000 hits since its new launch back in January 2007. 

The number of hits is now running at over 2000 "hits" per month.

28/05/2007 AQUABOX Launches new On-Line ordering service based on PayPal

AQUABOX have launched a new service for our supporters.  It is now possible to  place your orders for the AQUABOX product options or send your donations using the new on-line order form supported by the well-proven and secure "PayPal" payment service.

Supporters can of course still support us by downloading an order form from the web site and posting it back to us in the usual way.

We hope you will take advantage of this new quick and simple method of supporting us.  We look forward to recieving feedback on the value of this this new service and we will be monitoring your use of this new service with interest.

First Aquabox Gold Order Recieved 24/05/07

Ann Maxted of Sidcup Inner Wheel has the honour of ordering the first Aquabox Gold.

Thank you Ann.

16/05/2007 Aquabox Launches AQUABOX GOLD

A new Aquabox "Information Pack" is now available that supplements the old Aquabox Brochure.  This has given us the opportunity to launch :- 

  AQUABOX GOLD

  a new product based on Cromford based Aquabox Teams packing Standard Aquaboxes with new, bought-in components.  It also includes a second filter pack so extending the life of a box for a family of four from four months to eight months.

We have priced it at £80.00

See new downloadable order form attached

The contents major on hygiene, cooking and eating utensils, general support and  survival equipment and is more comprehensive than the standard recommended list.  The Aquabox  GOLD  weighs in at 25kg; the recommended maximum for one person to lift. 

New AQUABOX Information Pack; See Flyer No 3 AQUABOX GOLD
NEW ORDER FORM

20/05/2007 AQUABOX GOLD ARRIVES

                      AQUABOX GOLD

28/05/2007 AQUABOX LAUNCHES "PayPal"

Our supporters can now support AQUABOX directly by either donating or ordering Aquabox products directly on-line using the well proven and secure "PayPal" method of payment and the new web-based order form.  Supporters can of course still download order forms of the site and post their support direct to AQUABOX.

We hope that this new service will make it much easier for both Individuals and Groups to support us. 

We await your response to this new service with interest.

22/04/2007 Aquabox Supporters and Teams have shipped 22.6 m litres of water aid in 4 months.

Over the last four months, Aquabox supporters and teams have enabled 2461 Standards and 601 Aqua30's to be shipped into ten difference disaster zones.  The combined water purification capacity of the two types of boxes give the victims in the ten disasters zones an ability to generate 22.6 million litres of drinking water (22,600 tonnes).  The 2561 Standard Aquaboxes also contained roughly 37 tonnes of humanitarian items in addition to the usual water aid.

22/04/2007 Australian Ambassador hands over the 200 Phillippine Typhoon Aquaboxes in Bicol

The 200 Aquaboxes that we flew out to the Philippines typhoon victims in Bicol were handed over this weekend by the Australian Ambassador. The Aquaboxes were flown out by DHL and handed over to the local Philippine Red Cross Association.  The handover has been timed to coincide with the hand over of new housing for victims of the typhoon funded by the AusAID.  Mr Michael Buckley of DHL, Manila, and a son of a Wirksworth Rotarian, accompanied the Ambassador on a Philipinne Air Force service flight down to Bicol to oversee the handover of the Aquaboxes.   

Message fro Michael Buckley, DHL Manila. April 23/04/07

  David, All,

I was very pleased to join the Red Cross mission to Bicol yesterday to finally handover the Aquaboxes to the community of Curry in Bicol. We flew down on a Philippine Air Force plane and we were also joined by Senator Richard Gordon (Chairman of the Philippine National Red Cross), Australian Ambassador Tony Hely representing AusAID (which has generated funds to support food and housing programmes) as well as members of the International Federation of Red Cross that are based in the Philippines.

We visited three locations in total - housing materials and food were provided to the first two communities and food and Aquaboxes were distributed in the third community. I was given an opportunity to speak and was able to explain to everyone about Aquabox and the great work you are doing to support people affected by disasters around the world. All of the national press were present and TV footage was also made which is expected to be aired on this evening's news. I have asked for a tape of the footage and also official photographs which I will send over to you all as soon as I can. My assistant who travelled with me also took some photos and I've attached three of them here (we have a lot more which I will put on a disc and send to you).

The first picture (picture 34) shows Senator Gordon addressing the crowd in Curry. Picture 36 shows the first family receiving an Aquabox (the lady in the centre of the photo is blind) and Picture 41 shows the second family (note the banner in the background). Apologies to any of you that don't have broadband as these pictures are quite large.

The people we met were so pleased and happy with the support and assistance that they have received from the international community and I think they were particularly excited by the Aquaboxes after Senator Gordon opened one up and showed them all the sample contents. Many of these people of course lost everything (including in some cases their relatives) in the typhoon and they really need these kind of supplies as they work on rebuilding their lives.

This was a great experience for me. Please carry on your great work - with every box you are restoring hope and bringing smiles back to people's faces.

Best wishes,

Michael.

22/04/2007 Nottingham Police Convoy take 400 boxes to Albania

Nottingham Police take a convoy of trucks to Eastern Europe/Albania every year,  This year they have 400 Standard Aquaboxes on board to help the local families who survive at, or below, subsistance level.  The families typically on have access to safe drinking water for only about six weeks of the year or so.  These Aquaboxes will help the families through the difficult periods of the year when teh water is particularly contaminated plus give them some additional support with the gift of the humanitarian items.  This load contains a high percentage of Aquabox Golds, where Aquabox Golds are boxes filled by the Aquabox teams at Cromford with new, bought in, humanitarian aid items.  These are part of the initial pre-launch batch of Golds that we are working on before officially offering to supply Aquabox Golds to out donors; hopefully in the very near future.

12/04/2007 400 Aquaboxes Flown to Brisbane in Support of Solomon Island Tsunami Victims

On April 2nd, the epicentre of sub sea earthquake in excess of 8 on the Richter Scale generated Tsunami waves that first hit land in the the remote Western islands of the Solomon Islands. A massive 5 m Tsunami wave struck the town of Gizo. (Some first hand reports quote up to 10 m heigh waves breaking inland.) About 30 people were killed and 5,000 to 10,000 of the local villagers fled to the hills. Many of the coastal villages were badly damaged and some flattened.

400 Aquaboxes have been flown out to Brisbane by DHL to Rotary District 9600's WCS Committee for foward shipment into Honiara and onwards to Gizo and the surrounding villages. The three Solomon Island Rotary clubs are also in District 9600 and the local Rotarians will be co-ordinating the final distribution of the boxes to the victims of the tsunami.

The Rotary Club of Eltham, Aquabox's Australian partner Club, are shipping a further 20 Aqua30's out to the Solomon Islands via the Australian Foundation for the People of Asia and the Pacific (AFAP). These are leaving out of Sydney and should arrive in Honiara at a similar time as those passing through Brisbane.

Sydney Harbour stood by and Bondi Beach was closed to surfers as the Tsunami waves passed by.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 MSNBC News

....."Some of more than 2,000 people who spent Monday night camped on a hill behind the town of Gizo returned Tuesday to look for supplies or loved ones. Others were too afraid to venture to the coast amid more than two dozen aftershocks, including at least four of magnitude-6 or stronger.

 Julian Makaa of the National Disaster Management Office said more than 900 homes had been destroyed around Gizo and about 5,000 people affected.

 Boats reached Gizo on Tuesday from the Solomons’ capital, Honiara, carrying food and other supplies, some of which was distributed to survivors. But officials said shortages would become dire within days without more help.

‘Completely wiped out’ “There is no food available” in Gizo and Noro, a nearby town, said government spokesman Alfred Maesulia. “Some settlements have been completely wiped out by the waves.”

 Australia, New Zealand, the International Red Cross and the United Nations were among those offering aid. The United States announced a donation of $250,000 for immediate relief. No formal relief plan was announced after a day of meetings by senior government officials. Makaa said the airport had been cleared of debris and would reopen Wednesday.

Reuters TV A video grab shows locals who have been left homeless resting in the shade in the town of Gizo, in the Western Province of the Solomon Islands, on Wednesday.

 Six doctors and 13 nurses would be among the first flown to the towns of Munda and Gizo, where the region’s only hospital was inundated with water, he said.

 Disaster teams that flew over the coast around Gizo reported the “destruction was massive and widespread,” said Fred Fakarii, chairman of the National Disaster Management Council.

 Aerial TV footage showed tin- and thatched-roof buildings collapsed along the muddy shore. Other structures leaned awkwardly on broken stilts as men picked through the debris.

 “There are some very ragged, remote areas and there’s no connecting roads, (just) isolated villages,” Deputy Police Commissioner Peter Marshall told Australian Broadcasting Corp. radio.

 Makaa said officials could only guess at the numbers of dead in the most remote villages, where two-way radio is the usual mode of contact with the outside world.

 The earthquake, which struck about six miles beneath the sea floor and 25 miles from Gizo, set off alarms from Tokyo to Hawaii, testing procedures put in place after the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami that left 230,000 dead or missing in a dozen countries.

Warning systems But because of Gizo’s proximity to the epicenter, the destructive waves — up to 16 feet high — hit before an alarm could be sounded. The disaster has rekindled debate about whether the multimillion-dollar warning systems installed after the 2004 tsunami are worth the cost.

 “When you have a tsunami coming in so quickly after an earthquake, it doesn’t do much good to have an early warning system,” said U.S. earthquake expert Kerry Sieh. Officials would be better off putting more resources into disaster response education and efforts to permanently relocate vulnerable communities to higher ground, he said.

 Michael Rottmann, the U.N. special coordinator for the early warning system in Indonesia, said warning systems are useful if the message gets out quickly.

 “I think a lot of lives can be saved if you have a warning in less than 10 minutes,” he said. “If you have five minutes and you have a reliable warning, you can get very far ... up into a hill or away from the beach.”

 No significant tsunami was reported Monday anywhere outside the Solomons, which are comprised of more than 200 islands with a population of about 552,000 people. They lie on the Pacific Basin’s so-called “Ring of Fire,” an arc of volcanos and fault lines where quakes are frequent.

04/03/2007 Sierra Leone; More aid in support of the Long Term Refugee Camps

The Handsworth International Mission Services (Sheffield) shipped another 616 Standard boxes and 100 aqua 30's in January 2007 in support of their mission. 

 The Sierra Leone government is slowly reestablishing its authority after the long 1991 to 2002 civil war that resulted in tens of thousands of deaths and the displacement of more than 2 million people. This shipment is part of the long term contining support of the refugee camps that house about one-third of the population.

But domestic fighting among disparate rebel groups, warlords, and youth gangs in Cote d'Ivoire, Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone unfortunately perpetuate insurgencies, street violence, looting, arms trafficking, ethnic conflicts, and refugees in border areas.  The UN Mission in Sierra Leone (UNAMSIL) has maintained over 4,000 peacekeepers in Sierra Leone since 1999.  As a result of the local infighting, there are also 59,952 Liberian refugees in Sirra Leone (2006).

04/03/2007 Philippines; Senator Gordon, President of Philippine Red Cross, Accepts Aquaboxes

The president of The Philippine Red Cross, Senator Gordon, accepted the 200 Aquaboxes from the British Ambasador, Hon. Peter Beckingham. 

Michael Buckley of DHL Manaila and the son of Wirskworth Rotarian John Buckley, helped to oversee the shipping, local acceptance and hand over of the two hundred Standard Aquaboxes The Philippine Red Cross who will distribute them to victims of the recent typhoons.

News

UK Rotary Club donates water filtration equipment to typhoon-affected communities The Rotary Club of Wirksworth donated 200 “Aquaboxes” containing water filtration equipment to the Philippine National Red Cross for use in typhoon-affected communities where thousands of families still suffer from lack of resources including potable water. Each “Aquabox” can produce 1,100 liters of clean water. Also included in the donation are relief supplies including kitchen utensils, clothes and stuffed toys for children. The transport of the donation from UK to Manila was sponsored by DHL Global Forwarding Philippines. In the photo are DHL COO Michael Buckley, PNRC chairman Richard Gordon, UK Ambassador Peter Beckingham and DHL CEO Richard Strollo.

28/12/2006 Aquaboxes Airfreighted to the Philippines

Aquabox have air-freighted 200 Standard Aquaboxes out to the Philippines with the help of the  DHL's UK "Aid and Relief Department" and the Philippine National Red Cross.  This is the first time such a large batch have been directly air-freighted by Aquabox.  The route was finalised with the help of the staff in the local DHL office  in Manila and the intervention of the British Ambassador in the Philippines, Hon. Peter Beckingham.

The boxes will be distributed by the Philippine National Red Cross who are the only local organisation that are able to accept aid duty free/tax exempt.

Once the boxes have been distributed, Aquabox will be looking to see what follow up support is need, re need for further Standard Aquaboxes and the long term need for water clarification (Aqua30's).  In addition, whether Aquabox Stocks can be held in the country to cover the annual Typhoon season in preparation for similarly scaled disasters.  Typhoons are an annual event in the Philippines and it is just a matter of the number of Typhoons and the associated scale of the devastation that occurs each year.  Typhoon Durian was unusually destructive.

28/12/2006 Children In Honduras Enjoy Clean Water

The Children Of Honduras Trust based in Spondon, Derby, sent 10 Aqua 30's and 10 Standard Aquaboxes out to their mission in Honduras last March.They proved a great success.  Clean drinking water is a greatly prized luxury many cannot afford. They were distributed to several schools, children's feeding centres, a children's AID clinic and a prison.   The last location may come as a surprise.  The prison in the capaital has the worst quality water in the city.  Since very little is provided by the state, prisoners rely on their wives and partners, who come with their children, to visit them in prison and re-supply with basic nececessities otherwise unavailable to them.  Those visiting usually have to travel some distance in the heat, often on foot.  They need a drink while attending prison.  One of the Aqua 30 boxes has been allocated to the visitor's area so that, at least for a while, the children do not have to suffer for the mistakes of the parents by having to drink contaminated water during their visit.

The worst water is during the rainy season from May to Decemeber.  The heavy rains result in the water collecting mud and dirt. The water runs off the mountain and is collected in the community water tanks.   So buckets come in handy.

There is a continuing need for clean water in that, although some villages have been supplied with  filtered water sytems assocuated with the community water tanks.  Others villages will not have a supply until 2008.  There is therefore a continuing need for clean drinking water in some of the villages, and of course an on going need at the children's feeding centres, soup kitchens.

Masai School Children Have Clean Water to Drink

In support of Bishop John Haydon's mission in the Masai district of Tanzania, Aquabox sent 120 Aqua30's plus 400 Stacked boxes plus 400 buckets in June 2006. The Norwich Eastern Daily Press raised money to help the 100 schools in the Masai district and the Local Rotarian, Philip Chubb, asked that we support the cause by sending water purification aid.

This year has seen the worst draught in Tanzania for at least twenty yaers. And when the rains came in September/October, there was an expectancy that there would be an major outbreakbreak of Cholera. The children are most at risk because they have not built up an immunity having been breast fed for the first two to three years of the life.

With one Aqua30 and four Aquaboxes plus four buckets per school, there should be enough drinking water for the children to last a year and at least get the schools through the anticipated Cholera outbreak.

The children live 4000 feet up on the Masai Steppe, a very arid part of the world. The children bring in a bottle of dirty water into the schools in the morning, it is filtered during the day and they take a clean bottle home with them.