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Chartered Institute of Building, January 2006
Gimme Shelter. You might think it is nippy in the
UK, but Andy Cox has left the valleys of Wales to assist earthquake-stricken
Kashmir.
As winter hits the mountains of Kashmir, an engineer
from south Wales
has been working around the clock to get sample shelters designed
and built.
Abergavenny man Andy Cox is working as shelter engineer
for Irish humanitarian organisation GOAL. He said: 'We aim to save
lives by creating one warm room for the vulnerable. The people want
to remain on or near their homesteads for the duration of the winter,
and we want to facilitate this. Otherwise we will face a situation
where families stream downhill when the extreme cold sets in. They
will be crammed into camps and settlements, where the potential
for disease epidemics and social/protection issues will be extremely
difficult to counteract.'
GOAL is constructing twenty sample shelters for vulnerable
beneficiaries across its area of operation in Bagh district in Pakistani
Kashmir and will then provide material in the form of corrugated
iron sheeting (CGI), washers and nails.
Locals will construct their own temporary winter shelter
using materials supplied and recycled timber and tin from fallen
homes, based on the GOAL samples.
Beneficiaries - 7500 families in all - have already
received plastic sheeting for use as insulation material and flooring.
These complement winter tents and blankets as part of an overall
shelter survival package for Kashmiris this winter.
Samples shelters are placed in visible and accessible
locations in advance of the GOAL distribution of shelter materials.
Hundreds of timber frames have been built by Kashmiris before the
CGI arrives.
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