The HALO Trust - Afghanistan Earthquake Aid

With Afghanistan ranking fourth in natural disasters worldwide, the HALO Trust is fortunate to have been working in the country since 1988. This allows our staff to quickly respond to these natural disasters such as the three destructive earthquakes in the Herat province in southwest Afghanistan in early October 2023. These earthquakes occurred near the borders of Turkmenistan and Iran devastated the country. It was estimated that over 20,000 homes were seriously damaged while more than 113,000 people were affected and displaced.

The first earthquake struck in the late morning of October 7 in northwest of Herat. Unfortunately, this quake was very strong and resulted in mass casualties because of the lack of warning. 2,500 were sadly killed with over 2,500 people injured. 12 villages and more than 2,000 homes were destroyed. HALO distributed food packages with 21 items and kitchen supplies such as cooking gas for four villages and 200 families in the Injil and Zenda Jan districts.

The second earthquake occurred, a couple of days later, in the early morning of October 11 in the Injil, Zenda Jan and Rabati Sangi districts. Thankfully, people were more prepared for an earthquake, so the number of casualties was much less compared to the first earthquake. In response, we immediately deployed our team with an excavator and removed rubble and provided ambulance for first aid and evacuation. We also helped the affected families gather their personal belongings from the rubble.

A third earthquake, which was because of aftershocks from the second earthquake, happened on October 15, but thankfully, HALO, once again, swiftly provided aid.

HALO’s critical relief efforts would not have been possible without your generous support and the support of the GlobalGiving Foundation. Thank you for supporting our responses to these earthquakes and providing the essential support to those affected.