Southwestern Ontario aids quake recovery

Members of a Leamington, Ont.,church are asking people to pray for the safe return of 11 of its members stranded in Haiti following a devastating earthquake in the Caribbean nation.

"They are in a safe place," said Michael Olewski, youth pastor at First Baptist Church in Leamington. "We heard that everyone is doing well."

Pastor Larry Forsythe led the group to Haiti a week earlier to help open a medical clinic and install an irrigation system north of the nation's capital, Port-au-Prince.

Prayer vigils were scheduled for Wednesday evening at both First Baptist Church and Ambassador Baptist Church in Windsor, Ont.

In Chatham, Ont., Jeff Bultje scrambled to gather emergency supplies and medical equipment for a trip he was scheduled to take to Port-au-Prince on Thursday. He was originallybooked to leave on Wednesday to deliver a shipment of soccer equipment to an orphanage there, but his flight was cancelled because of the earthquake.

Bultje's cousin runs an orphanage and grade school in the Haitian capital.

He spoke to her by telephone after the earthquake and was relieved to learn she was all right.

But the International Committee of the Red Cross reports three million people have been affected, and Bultje hopes to help as many of them as possible.

By Wednesday morning, he had collected military bags donated by a store in Chatham that he hopes to use for supplies like food and tents.

"Large tents would be great because right now it's their winter there," Bultje told CBC News. "It cools down quite a bit at night. It's not going to be real great sleeping outdoors for those people."

Among those may be 70 girls who live at an orphanage in Port-au-Prince founded by Frank Chauvin, of Windsor.

The manager "was unable to get to the orphanage because the streets are all blocked off with the destruction of the buildings that all fell down on the streets," Chauvin told CBC News.

"I don't know what's going to happen to them," he said.