CYPRUS TODAY
August 19 - 25, 2000.
ISSUE No. 452
A Girne family
who used their computer business to trace more than 1,250 people during
four earthquakes last year, in Turkey, Greece and Taiwan, chose the
August 17 anniversary of the devestating first Turkish tremor to launch
a unique Internet-based service dedicated to finding "missing persons".
The new Locators
Online service, which went "live" at 3.01.37am on Thursday
- exactly a year, to the second, from when tremor struck - is the brainchild
of the Thomas family: dad Terry, his Turkish Cypriot wife, Fatma, and
teenaged children David and Alison.
This time last
year, the Thomases' Surf Internet Education Centre, in Girne, had become
the focus of attention from around the world, as a channel of inquiries
from people anxious to find friends and relatives "missing"
in the earthquake-struck region.
Now they have used
that "extremely nerve-racking" experience to form an "online
community of volunteers" to provide a similar service on a permanent
basis for "non-political and non-military disasters".
Through the Locators
Online website - which is dedicated to the victims of the Turkish, Greek
and Taiwanese 'quakes - people from around the world will be able to
post requests for help in tracing loved ones or friends.
David Thomas explained:
"For such an idea to work, we need volunteers to form our team
of locators. On becoming a locator, volunteers will be trained to use
the message tracking and response system that we developed for speedy
replies to the requests for help. Locators will be on stand-by; prepared
to receive requests for help as soon as there is an emergency situation.
"Location
requests will be made using an online form on the community's web site.
These requests will be directed to that country's locators, who will
try to establish the whereabouts of the missing person. Any information
the locator can obtain will then be relayed back to the requester and
to our headquarters."
He told Cyprus
Today the family had sent information this week about the new service
to some 800 people who had requested their help last year.
By yesterday, 502
people had replied, 10 of them volunteering to join the project, among
them photographers, social workers, lawyers, construction workers and
tourist guides - even one man whom the family tracked after last year's
Turkish 'quake. "He thanked us for all that we had done",
said David.
Sadly, five people
have written back refusing to join in, but David said their statistics
on replies so far had shown the highest interest levels in the US, followed
by Indonesia and then Turkey, Germany and Japan. The next-highest expression
of interest were from Belgium, then Australia, Brazil, Thailand and
Israel.
David said the
project had come about through a family decision. "We proved to
ourselves last year that we were capable of providing such a service.
We have also found that people are willing to help us."
He added: "We
are here to help locate anyone at any time, no matter what the circumstances
...
"At the present
time we are run purely by volunteers, but obviously we need funding.
At the moment we have one company - The Green Group - offering their
expertise in making our website more efficient, and we will be approaching
other companies. We don't really require financial aid - we need material
aid, such as communications equipment etc."
David said he had
tried to discover any similar services, but had found none. "We
are offering a unique service."
The
Locators Online website can be accessed at the following address: http://locators.iecnc.org