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EventStar erects temporary hospital structures following
the January earthquake in Haiti.
EventStar President Alain Perez had one message to his team when the company received the call to erect a hospital tent in Haiti following the devastating Jan. 12 earthquake: “This is about saving lives, we all have to make this happen in record time. Every minute could mean a life we can save.”The crew took that message to heart: EventStar, of Medley, Fla., was initially contacted on Jan. 16, and the temporary hospital was up and running the following day.
“Within hours of the call EventStar had mobilized all the needed equipment to the airport to be loaded into cargo planes departing that same evening for Haiti,” says Gerry Melendez of EventStar. “It was shipped with other humanitarian relief-related cargo. By Sunday morning, EventStar had a crew of 15 men including Perez on the ground erecting this emergency hospital structure.”
The company installed two 50-by-115-foot box beam structures to be used as the hospital and two 60-by-100-foot pole tents to serve as storage and sleeping quarters for medical personnel. EventStar also provided interior wall dividers, a raised wood flooring system, sound-attenuated power generation, power distribution, air conditioning units, lighting, glass doors, portable showers and latrines. According to the Miami Herald, the emergency hospital, run by the University of Miami’s Miller School of Medicine, became the largest functioning hospital in Haiti.
Time and transportation were the biggest challenges, but EventStar’s Emergency Management Division was prepared for rapid deployment. The company has kits prepacked with everything from hygiene products to hard hats for emergency response crews.
“The only thing our professional installers needed to do was show up to our headquarters to be taken to the airport,” Melendez says. “Our logistics partners were ready with the planes to airlift all of the equipment to Haiti.”
EventStar has a strong presence in the Caribbean, including offices in the Dominican Republic, two hours from the Haitian border.
“We have been involved with many projects in Haiti so we do feel a special connection,” Melendez says. “However, in a catastrophic event of this nature, we are all brothers, meaning the connection is felt no matter where in the world something like this would take place.”