Help Survivors of Nepal Earthquake

Six months after a 7.8 magnitude earthquake struck Nepal, your gifts have helped to rebuild the homes and livelihoods of families living in the hardest hit communities.      

The earthquake, and the subsequent aftershocks left a staggering 8,170 dead and destroyed around 285,000 homes, many of which were in the poorer mountain communities. We want to thank you for your quick and compassionate gifts when it was needed most.

Your support was vital in helping World Concern and our global partners respond in the days following the quake. Thanks to you, we were on the ground to distribute emergency first aid, and your gifts kept us there during the largest of the aftershocks, a 6.7 magnitude quake, which brought further damage and landslides. Knowing that your gifts were there, enabled us to provide food, water, shelter materials, and hygiene kits to thousands of families—all in all, you gave hope to an incredible 14,000 households.

In an emergency like this, the already poor families have nothing left. Their homes, their belongings … everything is either buried or broken. So to survive while they put their lives back together, they need three basic things: food, water and shelter. Friend, it was your gifts that provided this, and more, to those in need.

Uttam is a teacher and was working with some children outside in a field when the earthquake hit, “I saw all the homes collapsing and I thought I might die,” he recalls. He remembers hearing the screams of the children and thought to himself, “This is the last day of my life.”  Once the shaking stopped, panic set in. People were running everywhere, crying and shouting for loved ones. Fearing the worst, Uttam ran home to find his family safe, but his home destroyed, and his cattle dead.

In the days that followed, Uttam and his family sheltered under a tent, and waited for help. The school where he worked was a mess, his livelihood and animals lost, and his home reduced to rubble. So it was a welcome sight when World Concern arrived in his village and provided food and clothing for his family, along with building materials to help him rebuild.

This was all possible because of you!

All in all, you helped give emergency food packs to over 9,000 people, providing families like Uttam’s with rice, lentils, sugar, noodles, salt, oil, spices, soap, candles, matches, and rehydration power to treat diarrhea.

To keep his family out of the rain and the cold, it would have been tempting for Uttam to take shelter in the remains of his home or the school, but it was far dangerous.  So your gifts provided cold and vulnerable families like his with emergency shelter kits, including mattresses, blankets, tarpaulins, water filters, and roofing materials.

We’re so thankful for you, what an incredible gift you were to these families. From the other side of the world, you stood in the gap for people like Uttam and gave generously when they needed it the most. You showed a total of 1,852 families that you care about their safety and future, providing these shelter kits, and nutritious food so that children and parents could be safe, eat, and drink clean, disease-free water.

And even now your gifts continue to help rebuild homes, schools, and livelihoods, we can’t thank you enough.

“I would like to say thank you,” Uttam says to you. “It is good and we are thankful for helping us get back to a normal life.” From the bottom of our hearts, we thank you too.

Dear Friend,

Having just received the latest report from Nepal, I wanted to take a moment and remind you of the incredible difference you’re making in the lives of those affected by the earthquake. 

In the hours after the tragedy, your quick response was able to provide survivors with critical emergency supplies like food, tarps and blankets, water purification tablets and solar lanterns. 

And in the weeks and months since, your gifts have gone even further, giving medical care to the most vulnerable, and helping to transport additional food and building supplies into the mountain villages. 

Your support is life-changing, and means that the hardest hit communities can now begin putting their lives back together.  Before this, entire families would huddle together under a tarp; exposed to the weather and at greater risk of burglary and violence. This is no way for a family to live.

But thanks to you, countless families are beginning to see hope.  They are being provided with materials like corrugated iron sheets that they’re using to build temporary (yet stronger and safer) homes. You’re now keeping them safe from harm and sheltered from the unpredictable weather. 

When Uttam received materials to start rebuilding the family home, he was overwhelmed with joy. He had lost everything in the quake; his home and the animals he used for an income. Like so many others, Uttam's family were forced to sleep outside until help arrived. So when that came, he was understandably very excited.

"I would like to say thank you," Uttam says. "It is good and we are thankful for helping us get back to normal life."

It’s still an enormous challenge to reach the most isolated villages, but the supplies are getting through. Just a few weeks ago, World Concern volunteers travelled for over 12 hours across dangerous mountain roads to reach just one village. In every village they passed, the effects of the earthquake were distressingly clear. 

“It was suddenly very easy to see how in just 90 seconds people’s lives were torn apart,” one volunteer recounts.

In one of the villages nestled on the mountain, World Concern met with Anita and her young family who lost everything when the earthquake hit. They’ve been living under a tarp ever since and wondering where their hope would come from.

If you walk up the village path towards where Anita’s home once stood today, you will no longer see them living under a thin piece of plastic. Thanks to you, Anita and her family are now living in the safety and security of a temporary new metal shelter!

Anita and her son John give thanks saying, “We thank God for providing.  Now we are under a tin roof! We can survive in this home while we rebuild.” 

On behalf of families like Uttam's and Anita’s, I want to thank you for making such a difference.

With heartfelt gratitude,

Jacinta Tegman

President, World Concern