At the scenes of the mudslides and flash floods that killed over 500 people and displaced approximately 6000 others, volunteers played amazingly important roles in very many ways. According to Pieter Peters*, a resident of the downstream Kamayama community, rescuing people that were being washed away as well as recovering the dead from the gushing streams was frightening, but, he says, it had to be done. “We pulled both living and dead people from the flood waters in large numbers.”

Akeisha Benjamin, Zika Project Coordinator with the Trinidad and Tobago Red Cross society (TTRCS) explains, “As people are cleaning up from the floods we are pushing the message to get rid of stagnant waters as quickly as possible, to eliminate mosquito breeding grounds. Given the fact that some people had to evacuate and go to shelters, we are encouraging affected persons to clean up quickly. We are also working with the Regional Corporations to spread the message.” The focus of the project has primarily been on community and school’s outreach in selected areas.

According to Iran Red Crescent, at least 328 people have been killed and 3,950 injured. In Iraq, the Iraqi Red Crescent report that nine people have been killed and more than 425 injured.

The most severe mudslides – triggered by three days of heavy rains – occurred in the coastal suburb of Racecourse on the city’s eastern edge, as well as in Regent and Lumley where thousands of makeshift settlements are home to the city’s poorest communities.

Response teams, including dozens of Sierra Leone Red Cross (SLRCS) volunteers recovered people from the mud and debris, helping evacuate residents, transferring bodies to morgues and providing medical care to the injured.

Deep in the heart of the district of Kindo Koysha in southern Ethiopia, the road system is rudimentary. When volunteers from the Ethiopian Red Cross Society wanted to start distributing emergency water rations to the most vulnerable of families, getting there was a noted challenge. But, with people like Yonas Bade, a farmer and local volunteer on hand, it was a challenge that would be quickly overcome.

Volunteer Sonali Rani Das works as a nurse and has been a member of the mobile medical team since 2011. Currently the team is seeing 200 patients a day, all presenting complaints about the recent catastrophic floods that hit Bangladesh.

 We are seeing a lot of women and children. They have problems like skin infections, eye infections, scabies, diarrhoea and asthma. We have even seen snake bites. When I see the children, I take the mother’s blood pressure and check her over too,” she explains.