Haiti earthquake: Waiting for word in Miami’s Little Haiti

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Reporting from Miami, Fla. -- Someone had hastily printed and taped the sign to a door in a county social services building: Haitian Relief Information Center.

But in a sign of the brutal conundrum facing the thousands of Haitian and Haitian American residents here today, there was scant information within. Someone had delivered stacks of the morning’s Miami Herald, with a headline that blared ‘Desperation.’ There was a sign for a special State Department phone number that people could call.

But the small group of social workers in the otherwise empty offices said that calling the number usually yielded a recording. And, of course, calling Haitian relatives directly, in many cases, remained impossible two days after Tuesday’s powerful earthquake destroyed Port-au-Prince, Haiti’s capital.

Social worker Shirley Sieger knew these things because she was living through them. Sieger had been calling the cellphone of her mother, Olga Marie Dejean, 71, over and over again. The calls did not go through.

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-- Richard Fausset

Photo gallery: Earthquake hits Haiti | Twitter: Reports from Haiti | Resources: How to help

Top photo: A woman prays during a service for Haiti earthquake victims at the Notre Dame d’Haiti Catholic Church in the Little Haiti neighborhood of Miami. Credit: Angel Valentin / Getty Images.