• Subsistence herding families hardest-hit
• World Vision's relief response hits US $40 000
• Snowstorms affect World Vision's Khan-Hentii and Bor-Undor Area Development Programmes

Mongolia, May 28, 2008 - A sudden snow storm accompanied by hurricane winds of 144 km/h (40 meters per second) caught many unaware in the Hentii Province of Mongolia on May 27, resulting in 31 deaths including 11 children.

Children participating in World Vision's Sponsorship Programme are safe.

World Vision has provided 30 gers to those who have lost their homes in this disaster. Emergency supplies worth US $40,000 including 30 gers (Mongolian round felt tent) were distributed. Some 300 bottles of cooking oil, 300 bags of powdered milk, 3 MT (metric tons) of rice, 1.5 MT of sugar and 7.5 MT of flour are being provided to 300 needy families. 

Clothing and the repair of damaged homes and buildings is urgently needed. Animal feed is also in great need as most of Mongolia's population of roughly 3 million relies on subsistence herding of cattle, goats and sheep.

The hardest-hit villages include Batnorov, Berkh and Bayan-Ovoo. It is estimated that Bayan-Ovoo district lost 70 percent of its livestock.

The snowstorm damaged 4,293 buildings and left 87 families homeless. Some 14,000 herder families from 17 soums (villages) have reported 125, 500 animals killed; some 246,000 animals remain missing.

A World Vision Assessment Team conducted assessments in the affected area and discovered much of the livestock in the eastern region dead, their bodies littered along the Kherlen River.

Due to the catastrophic loss of livestock, two of World Vision's Area Development Programmes will offer an Animal Husbandry Project to help herders replenish their livestock.

Two emergency committees led by the Governor of Khentii province  and Deputy Minister of State are working with World Vision's Area Development Programmes Khan-Hentii and Bor-Undor, to overcome this devastation. 

Witness accounts said that at first it rained and was not cold. Suddenly the snowstorm descended with hurricane winds, uprooting trees and flinging livestock into the air.  People who were reported missing have now been found and are receiving attention for hypothermia and frost bite in village hospitals.

World Vision will continue to assess the situation in cooperation with the local government.

For more information contact Kurian James +976 99095975 (mobile) or Kurian_James@wvi.org or Alex Snary at Alex_Snary@wvi.org or +976-99117650 (mobile).