Rebuilding from the rubble

In the weeks and months following the 2010 Haitian earthquake, Haitians helped construct transitional shelters while earning an income and often learning new job skills, through an American red Cross program.

Courtesy Sam Kille

Morose's office building (DINASA), after the 2010 Haitian earthquake.

Courtesy Francklin Morose

Morose's office building (DINASA), after the 2010 Haitian earthquake.

Courtesy Francklin Morose

Alexa Morose, 7, at her home in Bellerose.

Courtesy Francklin Morose

FRANCKLIN MOROSE has come a long way since 2010, when a quake destroyed his home in Haiti.

Courtesy Francklin Morose

ALEXANDRA PIERRE, 13, washed up at a faucet that was recently installed at her school in Port-au-Prince with the help of the American Red Cross.

Courtesy Sam Kille

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

On Jan. 12, 2010, hundreds of thousands of people were killed and countless others injured by a massive earthquake that struck Haiti, leveling its capital, Port-au-Prince. The temblor, and the aftershocks that followed, spurred a global effort to send donations to the afflicted country.

That effort, said Francklin Morose, of Bellerose, saved his life.

Morose was a lifelong resident of Port-au-Prince who was working at the time in the finance department of DINASA National, an oil and gas company whose main fuel storage terminal is in the capital. The head of the finance department was killed in the quake, and several of Morose’s coworkers were injured.

“The wind started, and was shaking the building,” Morose remembered. “Everyone was screaming and crying. One of my coworkers was crying and saying, ‘We’re going to die.’”

Morose said that he and his coworkers, who were on the building’s second floor, decided as the shaking subsided that they needed to get out of the building, which was leaning dangerously. But the staircase was destroyed, so they ran to a window, ready to jump, but it was too high. Finally, Morose said, they found a bathroom window that was closer to the ground, and they jumped, one at a time.
The scene outside was one of total devastation. “That’s when we saw that there were a lot of people in the streets, covered with blood,” he said.

After walking nearly 10 miles back to his home — his car was destroyed by large debris — Morose found it nearly empty. His aunt had been killed, crushed by the house’s large beams. His mother, two brothers and two sisters had fled to a local public park.

His 5-year-old daughter, Alexa, was safe at an after-school program about six miles away, though she was traumatized by the disaster and desperately wanted to leave the country. Alexa had been born in Miami and was an American citizen.

“I moved a week later,” Morose said. “They were taking Americans back to the country, and I came with [Alexa].” He explained that the girl’s mother still lives in Haiti, and they are not married.