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我是從Skype上得知海地大地震的。我妻子傳訊息給我:「哎呀,地震!」然後消失了25分鐘。這是極為恐怖的25分鐘,美國成千上萬的人都有這種感覺。我很擔心會有海嘯,但當時我沒有意識到,在海地所感受到的恐懼更為強烈,那就是建築物倒塌了。我們都看過海地倒塌的建築物照片,這些是我妻子在地震後幾天拍的照片,那時我正在穿越多明尼加進入該國的路上。這是皇宮,相當於美國的白宮;這是加勒比最大的超市,在購物尖峰時間;這是一所護士學校,裡面有300個護士正在學習;隔壁的綜合醫院大部份都還完好;這是財政部。
我們都聽說了,在海地地震中喪生的人數相當多,但我們對這些人為什麼會喪生的原因卻不夠明白。我們沒聽說過為何建築物會倒塌,畢竟,是建築物而非地震帶走了二十二萬條人命,讓三十三萬人受傷,讓一百三十萬人流離失所,並切斷整個國家的食物、水源和物資來源。這是幾十年來發生在都會地區最大的災難,這並不是天災,而是工程疏失造成的災難。
AIDG(適當基礎建設發展組織)從2007年開始在海地工作,提供小型企業工程和商業協助,地震之後我們開始引進地震工程師,探究為何建築物會倒塌,檢查哪些建築物安全,哪些不安全。聯合國在海地的任務是和MINUSTAH(聯合國駐海地穩定特派團)合作,在公共建設部和其他非政府組織的合作之下,我們檢查了超過1500棟建築,我們檢查了學校和民宅,我們檢查了醫療中心、糧倉和政府大樓。
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以下為系統擷取之英文原文
I learned about the Haiti earthquake by Skype. My wife sent me a message, "Whoa, earthquake," and then disappeared for 25 minutes. It was 25 minutes of absolute terror that thousands of people across the U.S. felt. I was afraid of a tsunami. What I didn't realize was there was a greater terror in Haiti, and that was building collapse. We've all seen the photos of the collapsed buildings in Haiti. These are shots my wife took a couple days after the quake, while I was making my way through D.R. into the country. This is the national palace, the equivalent of the White House. This is the largest supermarket in the Caribbean at peak shopping time. This is a nurses' college. There are 300 nurses studying. The general hospital right next door emerged largely unscathed. This is the Ministry of Economics and Finance.
We have all heard about the tremendous human loss in the earthquake in Haiti, but we haven't heard enough about why all those lives were lost. We haven't heard about why the buildings failed. After all, it was the buildings, not the earthquake, that killed 220,000 people, that injured 330,000, that displaced 1.3 million people, that cut off food and water and supplies for an entire nation. This is the largest metropolitan-area disaster in decades. And it was not a natural disaster. It was a disaster of engineering.
AIDG has worked in Haiti since 2007, providing engineering and business support to small businesses. And after the quake, we started bringing in earthquake engineers to figure out why the buildings collapsed, to examine what was safe and what wasn't. Working with MINUSTAH, which is the U.N. mission in Haiti, with the Ministry of Public Works, with different NGOs, we inspected over 1,500 buildings. We inspected schools and private residencies. We inspected medical centers and food warehouses. We inspected government buildings.
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這是法務部,門後是國家司法檔案庫,門裡的那個人是Andre Filitrault,是水牛城大學跨學科地震工程研究中心主任,他為了修復檔案庫正在檢查門是否安全。Andre告訴我,在看見那些建築一次又一次以同樣方式崩塌後,並沒有出現任何新的研究,其中沒有什麼是我們不知道的,問題點都一樣。牆和天花板沒有好好固定在柱子上,那是一片懸在建築物上的屋頂,屬於懸臂構造,或不對稱的構造,歷經劇烈的晃動之後倒塌。糟糕的建築材料、水泥不足、磚砌得不夠密、光滑的鋼筋、暴露在外鏽蝕的鋼筋。
所有這些問題都有解決的辦法。我們知道如何把房子蓋好,智利就是一個證明。大約一個月後,智利發生8.8級地震,強度是發生在太子港7級地震的500倍,500倍的力量,但只有不到一千人員傷亡,以人口密度來看,其影響程度小於海地地震的百分之一。智利和海地的差別何在?建築物的抗震標準和加強磚造結構。建築物的作用是一體的,牆、柱子、屋頂和瓦片結合在一起,彼此支撐,不會分崩離析而倒塌。看看這座智利的建築,它從中間裂開了,但沒有變成一堆斷垣殘壁。智利人幾十年來都在建築上運用加強磚造技術。
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This is the Ministry of Justice. Behind that door is the National Judicial Archives. The fellow in the door, Andre Filitrault, who's the director of the Center for Interdisciplinary Earthquake Engineering Research at the University of Buffalo, was examining it to see if it was safe to recover the archives. Andre told me, after seeing these buildings fail again and again in the same way, that there is no new research here. There is nothing here that we don't know. The failure points were the same -- walls and slabs not tied properly into columns -- that's a roof slab hanging off the building -- cantilevered structures, or structures that were asymmetric, that shook violently and came down, poor building materials, not enough concrete, not enough compression in the blocks, rebar that was smooth, rebar that was exposed to the weather and had rusted away.
Now there's a solution to all these problems. And we know how to build properly. The proof of this came in Chile, almost a month later, when 8.8 magnitude earthquake hit Chile. That is 500 times the power of the 7.0 that hit Port-au-Prince -- 500 times the power, yet only under a thousand casualties. Adjusted for population density, that is less than one percent of the impact of the Haitian quake. What was the difference between Chile and Haiti? Seismic standards and confined masonry, where the building acts as a whole -- walls and columns and roofs and slabs tied together to support each other, instead of breaking off into separate members and failing. If you look at this building in Chile, it's ripped in half, but it's not a pile of rubble. Chileans have been building with confined masonry for decades.
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現在AIDG正與KPFF工程顧問公司以及人性建築組織合作,引進更多加強磚造技術訓練至海地。這位是Xantus Daniel,他是個泥水匠,只是個普通的建築工人,不是工頭,他接受了我們的一項訓練,他在上一份工作中,和老闆一起做事,他們使用錯誤的方式灌漿,他把老闆帶到一邊,讓他看加強磚造材料,他說:「我們不需要用錯誤的方法做,用正確的方式,成本也不會比較高。」後來他們重蓋了那棟房子,他們用正確的方法綁鋼筋,用正確的方法灌漿,那棟房子會是安全的,往後他們所造的每棟建築物都會是安全的。
為了確保這些建築物是安全的,需要的不是政策,而是對在工地工作的泥水匠伸出援手,幫助他們學習正確的技術。現在有很多組織都在做這件事,那個穿背心的傢伙叫做Craig Toten,他更進一步的把文件發給所有從事這項工作的組織,藉由Haiti Rewired組織,藉由Build Change、人性建築、AIDG等組織,而因此接觸到全國三、四萬個泥水匠,並推動使用正確建築方式。如果用合作方式和第一線的工人接觸,完全是負擔得起的。重建所耗費的數十億經費可以用來訓練泥水匠,讓每一塊錢都投注到他們一生所要建造的每一棟房子上。
最後,有兩個方法可以重建海地。上面那個方法是海地數十年來所用的建築方式,上面那個方法是用糟糕方式建造、將會倒塌的建築;下面那個方法是加強磚造結構,牆緊緊地結合在一起,建築物是對稱的,且能夠抵擋地震。對所有災難來說,現在有一個機會,可以建造更好的房子給下一代,因此,當下一次地震發生的時候,雖然會是一場災難,但不會是悲劇。
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Right now, AIDG is working with KPFF Consulting Engineers, Architecture for Humanity, to bring more confined masonry training into Haiti. This is Xantus Daniel. He's a mason, just a general construction worker, not a foreman, who took one of our trainings. On his last job he was working with his boss, and they started pouring the columns wrong. He took his boss aside, and he showed him the materials on confined masonry. He showed him, "You know, we don't have to do this wrong. It won't cost us any more to do it the right way." And they redid that building. They tied the rebar right. They poured the columns right. And that building will be safe. And every building that they build going forward will be safe.
To make sure these buildings are safe, it's not going to take policy, it's going to take reaching out to the masons on the ground and helping them learn the proper techniques. Now there are many groups doing this. And the fellow in the vest there, Craig Toten, he has pushed forward to get documentation out to all the groups that are doing this. Through Haiti Rewired, through Build Change, Architecture for Humanity, AIDG, there is the possibility to reach out to 30,000, 40,000 masons across the country and create a movement of proper building. If you reach out to the people on the ground in this collaborative way it's extremely affordable. For the billions spent on reconstruction, you can train masons for dollars on every house that they end up building over their lifetime.
Ultimately, there are two ways that you can rebuild Haiti, the way at the top is the way that Haiti's been building for decades. The way at the top is a poorly constructed building that will fail. The way at the bottom is a confined masonry building, where the walls are tied together, the building is symmetric, and it will stand up to an earthquake. For all the disaster, there is an opportunity here to build better houses for the next generation, so that when the next earthquake hits, it is a disaster, but not a tragedy.