More American citizens rescued from Haiti as flights continue to land in Central Florida

By Greg Fox

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    ORLANDO, Florida (WESH) — The flight from Haiti to Orlando was just 90 minutes, but the procession of exhausted people looked like they were half a world away from the chaos they escaped.

All nine passengers are Americans who were visiting or temporarily living in Haiti, and are now among 48 people — most of them Floridians — rescued during the past week.

The rescues have been conducted by the state under an executive order from the governor. The flight of nine passengers landed soon after another flight, carrying 21, landed late Saturday night at Orlando International.

With gang violence overtaking Port-Au-Prince, the evacuees from Cap-Haitien living outside the Capital wondered just how much time they had before they were trapped and their lives were in jeopardy.

Winzor Delucien, who is heading back to his South Florida home, told WESH 2 the gunfire was getting closer to where he was living.

“Everything was like ‘boom, boom, boom and bang, bang, bang,’ just all of the time,” Delucien said.

“Yes, I’m glad to be back,” said another woman who did not want to give her name or be interviewed as she headed into a state-provided shuttle van for the trip back to her Florida home.

Another woman, who only provided her first name, said she felt safe where she was in Haiti, but did not know for how much longer.

“When I was in Cap-Haitien, that was wonderful, but when in Port-Au-Prince, that was not so good,” Anise said.

Even though 14 people were flown into Sanford’s airport last week, a new, temporary facility at Orlando International Airport is likely the hub for processing those on emergency flights in the days and possibly weeks ahead.

It’s called a multi-agency resource center, and it’s set up much like a post-disaster operation. People may need medical attention or a new driver’s license because they lost theirs in a rush to get out of Haiti. Phone companies have even donated free cellphones.

“Our goal right now is to fly people out every day,” said Florida Emergency Management Director Kevin Guthrie.

He’s hoping the state contractor can fly one or more flights per day, adding, “So I think you’ll see us bring our aircraft size down from the 20 or 30 passenger planes to the 10 or 12 passenger planes so we’ll have full flights being cognizant of taxpayer dollars, but again it’s going to be more complicated as we move forward.”

Guthrie will be talking with the State Department this week to go over the list of 550 people requesting evacuation and determine which arm of the government will get them out of Haiti.

Another plane carrying four missionaries is expected to land sometime overnight in Orlando.

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