Japan and a joint Jordanian-Jewish exercise

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Jolted by the level of devastation in Japan, Jordan and Israel are getting together to prepare for our own expected big earthquake.
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All photos by Dani Machlis/BGU

Is this not a heart-warming picture?
One stretcher-bearer from the Jordanian Red Crescent and one from Israel's Red Magen David.
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Photo by Dani Machlis/BGU

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One week ago the two medical organizations and Ben-Gurion University of the Negev held an "Exercise Simulating a Response to an Earthquake" in Timna, down south in the Arava valley.

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Ben-Gurion University's photographer, Dani Machlis, covered the event and he has very graciously agreed to share his beautiful photos with us for this post.

Thank you, Dani!

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Photo by Dani Machlis/BGU

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Two hundred people took part, including trained professionals that included academic faculty and students at BGU.

Together they treated the simulated "wounded" and set up a tent camp for those who would have been made homeless by a quake, for example, in the nearby cities of Eilat and Aqaba.

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Students (including Jordanians) can study for a bachelor's degree in emergency medicine at Ben-Gurion U. medical school.

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Please see more about the joint exercise in the Jerusalem Post.
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The earthquake-prone Great Rift Valley (the Syrian-African Rift) runs along the shared border of Jordan and Israel.

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The Israeli city of Eilat and the Jordanian Aqaba are on the bottom of the map.

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These troubled days we are greatly admiring Japan's embedded culture of preparedness and we will try to learn to be more like the Japanese.

Meanwhile, an Israeli team is setting up a field hospital in a hard-hit fishing village north of Tokyo and we are sending mattresses, blankets, coats, gloves and chemical toilets.

Our hearts and prayers are with the Japanese people.

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(The J theme is a contribution to today's ABC Wednesday meme. )

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Bloodmobiles

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Jerusalem is suffering through a whole week of abnormal temperatures in the mid 30s C.
Today it was 37!
I took refuge in the airconditioned Malcha Mall.

It struck me funny that two Magen David Adom bloodmobiles were unloading at the Toys R Us entrance, under a blood red arch.
Like . . . let's play vampire!
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Later I saw the technicians upstairs on the shopping floor setting up five cots, a privacy screen, and a table and chair.
Needles are not my thing so I didn't wait around for the first donors.
Anyway, I would not have had the nerve to photograph.
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Special report on today's targil

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FEAR NOT, this is only a PRACTICE DRILL.

At 1:00 today police cordoned off the main street of Jerusalem's Machaneh Yehuda open-air market.
Rescuers, first responders, and police all played their part in responding to a mock mega terrorist attack.

Border Police took stock of the situation where plumes of artificial smoke were rising.

Soon small groups of Border Policemen were patrolling up and down busy Jaffa Road in single file, no doubt searching for more bombs or suicide bombers.

Yasam, the special riot police, zipped in and out.

If you enlarge this photo, you can see the new (what I think are called) ambucycles of Magen David Adom.

They have two wheels in front, one in back.

Then the simulated wounded were evacuated to waiting ambulances.

Fortunately sirens were not blaring continually. This I think contributed to the rather calm, albeit serious, atmosphere.

Notice the medic's ritual fringe. Many of Jerusalem's rescue volunteers are religious.

All the wounded had a big tag hung on them.

These Palestinian men looked on, probably while the fruit and vegetable stalls where they work were closed for the two hours of the drill.

Here comes the fire engine.

Everyone has a vest identifying his or her function--medic, paramedic, etc..

Enter the forensic police.

The Magen David Adom van is called Taran, short for Tachanat eru'a rav nifga'im, meaning "station for an event with multiple casualties."
The man in white is a Zaka volunteer. Zaka is the Hebrew acronym for Disaster Victims Identification. These are the haredi (very Orthodox) men who collect the remains of the dead, no matter how small, for proper burial. They deserve a whole separate post.

The social workers and psychologists were sent in from the Jerusalem Municipality.

Thank God, this time the "dead" were but dummies, with black tape keeping their eyes closed.

Plastic arms and legs were scattered on the pavement.

Folding the Zaka body bags.

At the end of two hours of intense activity, the barricades were slid back. The firemen took down their ladder, and the public was free to resume shopping.

Only at the very end were the photojournalists allowed in, after the exercise was over.

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The police order was for us, we the public, lachzor lashigra, to return to our normal routine.

This is said very often in Israel and is held to be very important in order to keep one's sanity.

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