Tens of thousands feared dead in Haiti earthquake

PORT-AU-PRINCE -- Thousands were feared dead in a major earthquake that destroyed the presidential palace, schools, hospitals and hillside shanties in Haiti, its leaders said Wednesday.

A Canadian woman is among the dead. Yvonne Martin, a retired Ontario nurse volunteering with the Evangelical Missionary Church of Canada, was killed. She arrived in the country on the day the tremor struck.

Two RCMP officers, Doug Coates and Mark Gallagher, who are part of a U.N. force in Haiti are missing. The two were part of a group of 82 police officers working with the United Nations stabilization team.

A five-story U.N. headquarters building was demolished by Tuesday's 7.0 magnitude quake, deemed the most powerful tremor in Haiti in more than a century.

Fourteen U.N. workers have been confirmed dead, including 10 Brazilians, three Jordanians and one Haitian.

The death toll is expected to rise because 150 U.N. employees are missing.

Among them is the head of the MINUSTAH peacekeeping mission in Haiti, Hedi Annabi, and his deputy.

Haitian President Rene Preval declared that Annabi, a Tunisian, had been confirmed dead, but U.N. officials cast doubt on his remarks.

Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive told Reuters that he believed there could be "in the range of thousands of dead." Soon after, Bellerive told CNN he believed well over 100,000 people could have died.

Preval called the damage "unimaginable" and described stepping over dead bodies and hearing the cries of those trapped in the collapsed Parliament building, where the senate president was among those pinned by debris.

Destruction in the capital was "massive and broad," and tens -- if not hundreds -- of thousands of homes were destroyed, a spokesman for the U.N. mission said.

Sobbing and dazed people wandered the streets of Port-au-Prince, and voices cried out from the rubble.

"Please take me out, I am dying. I have two children with me," a woman told a Reuters journalist from under a collapsed kindergarten in the Canape-Vert area of the capital.

The presidential palace lay in ruins, its domes fallen on top of flattened walls. Preval and his wife were not inside when the quake hit.

The quake's epicenter was only 10 miles from Port-au-Prince. About 4 million people live in the city and surrounding area. Many people slept outside on the ground, away from weakened walls, as aftershocks as powerful as 5.9 rattled the city throughout the night and into Wednesday.

The devastation crippled the government and the U.N. security mission that had kept order. There were no signs of organized rescue efforts, and people clawed at concrete chunks with their bare hands to try to free trapped loved ones.

Haitian Red Cross spokesman Pericles Jean-Baptiste said his organization was overwhelmed. "There are too many people who need help. We lack equipment, we lack body bags," he told Reuters.

Normal communications were cut off, roads were blocked by rubble and trees, electric power was interrupted and water was in short supply.

In New York, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said those unaccounted for at the U.N. mission headquarters included the chief of the mission, Hedi Annabi, but he could not confirm reports Annabi had died.

Brazil's army said at least 11 Brazilian members of the 9,000-strong U.N. peacekeeping mission in Haiti were killed.

The poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, Haiti is ill-equipped to respond to such a disaster, lacking heavy equipment to move debris and sufficient emergency personnel.

Canadians, other countries send support

"I am appealing to the world, especially the United States, to do what they did for us back in 2008 when four hurricanes hit Haiti," Raymond Alcide Joseph, Haiti's ambassador to Washington, said in a CNN interview.

"At that time the U.S. dispatched a hospital ship off the coast of Haiti. I hope that will be done again and help us in this dire situation that we find ourselves in."

U.S. President Barack Obama called the quake an "especially cruel and incomprehensible" tragedy and pledged swift, coordinated support to help save lives. The Pentagon was sending a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier and three amphibious ships, including one that can carry up to 2,000 Marines.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper said Tuesday evening that Canada "stands ready to provide any necessary assistance to the people of Haiti during this time of need."

"Canadians are profoundly concerned about the impact of today's earthquake in Haiti. On behalf of all Canadians, I wish to extend my sincere sympathies to all affected by this disaster," Harper said in the statement.

A 20-member reconnaissance team is headed to Haiti to assess the impoverished Caribbean nation.

Foreign Affairs Minister Lawrence Cannon told reporters Wednesday morning the reconnaissance team, comprised of Canadian military members, and those with engineering and technical backgrounds, hopes to arrive in Haiti later in the day.

The military's Disaster Assistance Response Team, a unit that provides emergency medical care and clean water, will deploy once it gets word on what is needed.

About 6,000 Canadian citizens live in Haiti.

Ninety-five Canadians, mostly police officers, work with the UN stabilization force in the capital.

Canadian trapped

Canadian diplomats are racing to get help to a Canadian woman trapped in the rubble in Haiti. The person managed to get a text message out to the Canadian government.

There are more than 80,000 people of Haitian origin living in Canada, many of whom live in Quebec.

Governor General Michaelle Jean, who was born in Haiti, said in a statement Tuesday night that she was following "with great attention and concern, the emerging reports regarding the earthquake that struck Haiti with force."

The United Nations said $10 million would be released immediately from its central emergency response fund and it would organize a flash appeal to raise more money for Haiti over the next few days.

The United States, China and European states were sending reconnaissance and rescue teams, some with search dogs and heavy equipment, while other governments and aid groups offered tents, water purification units, food and telecoms teams.

"The earthquake that struck Haiti was so devastating because as well as being large its source was at a shallow depth of about 10 km. Closeness to the surface is a major factor contributing to the severity of ground shaking caused by an earthquake of any given magnitude," Dr. David Rothery, a scientist at Britain's Open University, explained Wednesday.

"Furthermore, shaking tends to be greatest directly above the source. In this case the epicenter was only 15 km from the center of the capital, Port-au-Prince, which therefore suffered very heavily."

With files from Canwest News Service