Rotary distributes water filters in Dominica island The mission to provide clean, quality drinking water to Dominicans through 460 filter units and 280 buckets was led by Rotary Club of Leogane, Haiti, in association with Waves for Water.
On October 25, Fritz Pierre-Louis, President of the Rotary Club of Leogane (Haiti, District 7020) arrived in Dominica and made contact with officers of the Rotary Club of Portsmouth.
His mission was to establish a joint effort between Rotary and a US-based charity called Waves for Water.
Their mandate is to deliver fresh pure drinking water to those in extreme need.
President Fritz arrived by plane and the following day two representatives from Waves for Water (www.wavesforwater.org) Brent Lievsay and Ben Bourgeois sailed from St Croix, arriving in Portsmouth with 460 filter units and 280 buckets.
On Thursday (October 26), they provided members of the Rotary Club of Portsmouth and several community representatives with nine units and trained them on how to assemble the kits.
The following day Rotarians and volunteers had a busy and long day providing training on how to assemble and use the units.
– Right by the riverbank in Dublanc 80 systems were distributed.
– In Portsmouth at the home of Wayne Abraham, who has served the community relief effort via ham radio services plus providing a much needed place for people in the community lacking power to charge their phones and other devices, 37 unites were demonstrated and distributed.
– 15 systems where provided at the primary school in Savanne Paille.
– In front of the UNICEF tent at Bense village primary school 16 more systems were made available to households.
The following day, October 27, it was the east coast of the island.
In the Kalinago Territory the Chief helped gathering many of the families for presentation and 80 drinking water producing systems were handed out and assembled.
Castle Bruce received 32 systems. And four were given out after demonstrations that were done right on the street in Marigot and five more were provided in Wesley.
The team left 180 additional filters for which the Rotary Club needs to obtain buckets.
The cost of this relief effort is being shared by the Rotary Club of Portsmouth and the Roseau Rotary Club of Dominica.
After additional buckets are obtained Roseau Rotary will distribute the remaining systems in the south end of the island.
The water filtration units are manufactured to filter and purify 100 gallons of water per day with an output of one liter per minute.
This simple but effective system filters to 0.1 microns absolute and will remove 99.999% of bacteria such as protozoa and cyst such a E coli, Giardia, and salmonella.
The mission of Fritz Pierre-Louis, President of the Rotary Club of Leogane, Haiti, and Waves for Water was very successful and the Rotary Club of Portsmouth will source more water filters and buckets in an effort to give many more Dominicans easy access to good quality filtered drinking water.
Rebuilding Dominica starts with good health for each individual and good health starts with absolutely safe drinking water.
Source: St Lucia News Online
