News around Rotary - be Inspired!
The Rotary Club of Adelaide Central starts 2024 with oustanding news: our Club's 40 foot shipping container filled with approximately AU$600,000 of repurposed hospital and medical equipment:-
- Safely arrived in Freetown, Sierra Leone, West Africa
- Was passed through customs and loaded onto a truck
- Successfully made the 1.5 hour drive south to Tombo
- Was opened and the contents found to be 100% in good condition
- Was unloaded by locals into their new Community Hospital
The local Tombo community has been working feverishly to finalise stage 1 of their new local hospital and now turn their attention to external infrastructure to pave and build safe access into the facility.
PHOTOS and VIDEOS on this page from January 2024 show how quickly everything is moving forward, with our 40 foot container of Hospital Equipment now unloaded.
IMMEDIATE HELP is needed for a couple key items that will make the Hospital self sufficient and sustainable for many years to come:-
1) A WATER PUMP (valued at AU$1,500) is needed to connect to an existing well to draw fresh water to supply the hospital and locals.
2) A GENERATOR (valued at AU$2,500) is needed to ensure consistent electricity supply, noting that Sierra Leone's power grid (particularly in the Tombo region) is very unreliable. It is common that the power is off for more hours of the day than it is operational.
The Rotary Club of Adelaide Central members are now turning our attention to funding these key necessities.
If you are able to support Rotary in our quest to support this isolated community, your Tax Deductible Donation will greatly appreciated through our Club's official Rotary Australia World Community Service (RAWCS) project:
< click here to donate >
MORE INFO links >
• Our Club's initial Project focus
Preparing the 40ft Shipping Container of Medical and Hospital equipment
• Packing the Container
Showing progress in late 2023 getting it together to Freight to West Africa
• Salmana Heart Foundation Hospital
Info about the Facility our Container of Equipment will support
With the majority of the internal fixtures and fittings for the hospital close to completion - focus now moves to external paving and safety / access infrastructure. [ CLICK PHOTOS to see Full Size images ]
January 2024 - External grounds preparation work complete and the start of paving supplies arrive ready for the locals to build safe access infrastructure. [ CLICK PHOTOS to see Full Size images ]
A major priority for January 2024 is sourcing a new Water Pump for the Well in front of the hospital, to access a reliable supply of fresh water. Our Rotary Club needs to raise AU$1,130 to achieve our goal ... can you help - please phone 0410 523 106. [ CLICK PHOTOS to see Full Size images ]
Locals wait for the 'man down the well' to mix the concrete in the bucket, with the right amount of water, to hoist it back up.
There's our 40 foot container! Up top in the Port of Freetown, Sierra Leone - safe and sound (December 2023)
SAFE - our container of Hospital Equipment made it 1.5 hours south to Tombo (December 2023)
Step 1 of Unloading was to get ALL of the equipment from the Container into the Women's Wing of the hospital, ready for sorting and set-up across the Womens / Kids / Mens separate zones. [ CLICK PHOTOS to see Full Size images ]
With the first 10 of the 30 beds set-up in the Men's wing, the Hospital is starting to take shape.
For a community with no health care facilities at all, now the kids ward can offer some quality space for medical care.
Unloading the Container was a BIG job for a chain of locals - so much to get inside (December 2023)