Israel’s hard-won disaster expertise reaches South America

Article published on ISRAEL21c July 29, 2010
By Karin Kloosterman

Israeli experts in disaster response stress communication and infrastructure planning when teaching Chilean professionals how to cope with mass casualty situations.

It was a strange twist of fate: At the same time as an Israeli emergency response team was planning a program to train Chilean professionals in how to handle mass casualty situations, disaster struck in Chile, when an 8.8 Richter Scale earthquake hit the country in February, killing hundreds.

Last month, an Israeli team of six professionals traveled to Santiago to analyze the aftermath of the disaster and hold a five-day workshop to train more than 300 emergency response personnel from Chile and Paraguay in how to deal with mass casualty events.

Israel's long history of coping with terror and formidable road accidents has prepared the country to deal with the worst, says Gila Hyams who heads the Teaching Center for Trauma Mass Casualty Situations at Rambam Hospital in Haifa, Israel.

She and her team travel the world teaching medical staff and response teams how to deal with events that most people would prefer not to even think about.

While Hyams was aware of the earthquake in Chile, she tells ISRAEL21c that she could never have imagined the scope of the disaster because it wasn't emphasized in the media she was exposed to in Israel. "When we arrived there they took us to the area of the tsunami, which was caused by the earthquake, and we saw something unbelievable," she recounts.

"We've learned with blood"

A whole village on the country's southern coast that was built in contravention to the building codes had been swept into the sea, killing 60 people. Adding to the tragedy, the community center set up to deal with emergencies was also swept away with the massive tidal wave, leaving no place for the critically injured to be treated. And the absence of efficient communication with the authorities to secure needed help - even for the most basic things like bandages - made matters even worse.

In their workshop, the Israeli team, comprised of doctors and members of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), focused on communication and infrastructure planning - the two most problematic areas in the Chilean experience. And since by Latin American standards Chile is considered a very developed country, it is hoped that the ripple effects of the workshop will be better emergency responses in the entire region.

Each of the six Israelis led a working group, through which they shared the Israeli experience, unique in the world. Hyams says that the workshop "was a real eye opener" for the participants. "We've learned through blood, through the mass causalities we have here [in Israel] from terror attacks," she says. At the same time, Hyams feels compelled to mention "... the heroism of the medical teams that worked in such awful conditions during the catastrophe."

Israeli and Chilean participants in the course designed to help Chile handle mass casualty situations in the wake of disasters.

Among the Chileans who attended the workshop were senior members of Chile's air and ground forces and representatives from its rescue units and police force. News of the Israeli delegation also drew 12 doctors and nurses from Paraguay.

"These people get paid for this and we regulate what they need to do," explains Hyams, who has also brought a number of teams to the United States where American peers learn about the Israeli response to emergencies.

She has been to Dayton, Ohio; to a conference at New York University; another in Dallas, Texas; and most recently her team was in Detroit, to trade tips with specialists there. "We learn about trauma, and it is mass casualty we teach. We have more experience in this area unfortunately," she says. Also, due to Rambam's expertise with mass casualties, the center recently held a course in trauma for medical personnel in NATO countries.

Stressing communications and infrastructure

Team member Dr. Amir Blumenfeld, former head of the IDF Trauma Unit, relates that communications were so uneven following the earthquake in Chile that "... when we arrived there we found that... in some of the areas nobody knew what had happened." And Hymans adds, "There weren't enough people to treat the injured. They couldn't even find bandages.

"One of the most important points to stress when dealing with this situation is collaboration between ambulance, police and army and hospitals. They didn't have this in Chile. We have many things in place [in Israel], on our computers, and a network that connects representatives, on call, who are ready to deal with a state of mass casualties," he tells ISRAEL21c.

"When they get the calls they will all arrive to the same place for command and control, which will include a rep from the ministry of health, the hospitals, police and army." This is so all the forces can be united on a common front. And while it sounds intuitive, a lack of communication and ground control was one of the criticisms that the Bush Administration faced over its response to Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans.

Hyams lauds the Jewish community in Santiago for helping to rebuild the local medical support system: "The pictures here are very difficult. Four months after the disaster there is still damage everywhere. Where hospitals once stood, there are now tents," she says, pointing out that the Jewish community's assistance has been very significant.

She would like to return to Chile and is in contact with MASHAV, Israel's National Agency for International Development Cooperation, in the hope that the organization will help sponsor more workshops or bring Chileans to Israel to learn more. Her idea is to organize more workshops through a local MASHAV office in Santiago, set up to service the wider Latin American region.

The recent June workshop in Chile was sponsored by Israel's Rambam Hospital; Israel's Ministry of Health, the Jewish community in Chile, and the Las Condes Hospital, a private medical facility in Chile.

2,000-Year-Old Gold Coin a Testament to Galilee Ancient History

Article Published on Arutz Sheva July 18, 2010

By Hana Levi Julian

A 2,000-year-old gold coin discovered by a West Virginia University student at an archaeological site in the upper Galilee has proven to be the find of the season.

It is the first Antonius Pius coin ever found in Israel and was discovered by Alexis Whitley and her friend, on one of the hottest days of the summer. The two were clearing away dirt and rocks at the Bethsaida site when suddenly, Alex spotted the sparkle of a coin as it slipped down.

Unaware of its significance, it took a while for Whitley to understand why excavation director Dr. Rami Arav immediately had her pose with the coin as photographers raced to the site.

The coin, which Arav described as a discovery of Biblical dimensions, weights 7 grams of 24-karat gold – 97.6 percent gold, to be exact. It depicts the portrait of Antonius Pius, a Roman emperor who rules from 138-161 CE.

“Not every job that is boring has boring results,” Arav chuckled, when asked in an interview with Israel National News how he managed to stay focused on one site for the past 24 years. “Sometimes the results are fascinating.”

Arav, a professor at the University of Nebraska, said the coin was issued to celebrate Pius' designation of consul for a second time, which according to historical records took place in the summer of 138 CE. He noted that Pius' ascension to consul should have been indicated with an announcement on the flip side of the coin – but instead, the coin shows a portrait of the goddess Pietas – which the chief archaeologist said may have been a rare and valuable misprint. “Somebody in the Roman Imperial mint goofed. It is like having a rare and mistaken silver dollar,” Arav explained.

The coin also supports the theory that Pius embraced the Jewish population in Rome, unlike his father, who brutally oppressed the Jewish revolts. Pius is considered to have been a personal friend of Rabbi Yehudah (Judah) the Prince, creator of the Mishnah.

Bethsaida was founded as a capital of the ancient kingdom of Geshur and was the birthplace of at least three Christian apostles – Peter, Andrew and Philip. The ancient town is located at Park HaYarden, north of Lake Kinneret, also known as the Sea of Galilee. The site, discovered by Arav in 1987, has seen 24 seasons of excavations thus far.

Other finds over the past years have included a golden earring, an Athenian tetradrachm, a small Egyptian figurine (Pataekos) and common cooking pots.

The golden earring was made of two pieces comprised of the head of an unidentified animal, decorated with small gold balls, with gold and silver twisted filigreed strings, soldered together with a gold strap.
The tetradrachm, a find which relates to the Persian period(450-330 BCE), dates back to approximately 450 BCE, according to a post on the Bethsaida excavation web site. The small figurine depicting the Egyptian god Pataekos was unearthed from beneath a 10-cm level of sediment of red burnt soil at the dig in 1994. Although most of the blue glazing was faded or peeled away, noted Arav at the time, “a few deposits under the right arm and under the neck indicate its original turquoise color.”

A globular cooking pot was also found at the site, one of the most common that exists in the excavation of the Hellenistic-Roman periods in the Land of Israel. The globular pot, equipped with two handles that emerge from the rim and were attached to the shoulders, was a common find at the site, said Arav.

He added that the coin, as well as all the other finds at the Bethsaida dig, remain the property of the State of Israel. “It is part of the heritage of this country,” he said. “Soon after the professional publication of the coin it will go to the Israel Antiquities Authority and I believe that it will be on display in a museum.”

The Bethsaida Excavation is being carried out by a consortium of 20 universities and colleges worldwide, Arav explained. Among the institutions involved are American, European, Australian and Israeli universities, headed by the University of Nebraska at Omaha.

SafeRise Apartment Security System Developed by Israeli General

Forget the World Cup, think soccer robotics

Article published on ISRAEL21c July 8, 2010
By Karin Kloosterman

The Israeli national team didn't make the cut for this year's World Cup soccer tournament, in fact they've only made the cut once -- in 1970. But that doesn't faze Israelis who are more known for their high tech prowess, over sport, any way. Using their brains instead of brawn, a group of Israeli researchers and their students headed to Singapore for six days in June to coach their own kind of soccer team -- one made of robots at the annual RoboCup tournament.

They might not have won the prestigious tournament, but in the good spirit of robotics and diplomacy the team played against Texas and Austria, practiced with Turkey, and was even invited to come with their robots to Iran.

It's the second year that Israelis have been invited to the robotic soccer league, the Robot World Cup, which pits robots from different universities around the world against each other. Going in with an advantage, making the cut among only 24 teams from around the globe, Israel's Team BURST from Bar Ilan University had to deal with a "repository" failure calling on their human support team to race around the clock trying to fix the robots before kickoff.

In the end the Israeli university team placed nowhere near the top, yet "we scored a goal," boasts Dr. Eli Kolberg, on the committee of the RoboCup league, and researcher at Bar Ilan University. He also escorted a junior high school team from Holon, Israel, which won a robotics dance competition.

Playing with plastic, chips and brains

The official team from Israel included four robots and 13 researchers from Bar Ilan, among who were 11 of the school's best graduate students from the Department of Computer Sciences. Normally students don't get access to the kind of classes that prepare them to build high-end robotics projects -- especially ones that teach robots how to run, kick, head but and try to score penalty goals:

"One of the unique things about the robotics program at the Computer Science department is our emphasis on inclusion of undergraduate students in state-of-the-art research projects. There are very few universities in the world, let alone Israel, where undergraduate students can take regular classes, in which they face state-of-the-art research challenges in robotics," said Prof. Gal Kaminka, a researcher at Bar Ilan University who heads the team.

The Israeli team of robots might not have the face of Beckham or the speed and balance of Pele, but they've got brains. And that's the research teams' tactic on the "field". "The competition is really about programming the software brain that controls each robot," says Kaminka. "Each robot has a camera, range sensors, a computer, and independent motion capabilities. They cannot rely on human intervention or guidance in any way or form. However, they can communicate with each other.

"There's a very exciting story of which RoboCup is only a symbol, a front: the story of the birth of Israeli robotics in recent years," he explains to ISRAEL21c. "This is reflected not only by academic efforts such as RoboCup, but also what is happening in the industry, with both large defense integrators as well as small start ups that are popping up," he says.

An ER situation and "sports medicine"

"There's a sense that the market is moving at an accelerated rate. I know that all of sudden, after years of having my PhD and MSc student graduate to jobs in larger companies, suddenly two of them are off to start their own robotics companies. One of them, Cogniteam, actually sponsored our team.

"This was a factor in my decision to open RoboCup to undergraduate students - an unusual decision, given their inexperience. I wanted to make sure that Bar Ilan is producing students with knowledge in robotics at a faster rate."

Before the team arrived in Singapore on June 19, the Israeli BURST team was pretty confident of a win. But disaster struck almost immediately. "After a few hours of work during the first set-up day, we discovered that our code went through a meltdown," the students wrote on their blog.

"Things that worked in the lab, no longer work. Repairs just seem to make things worse. We have been working 22 hours a day to stabilize the situation. Some of the students are falling asleep at the keyboard. The amount of caffeine intake is just astounding: The current rate is eight espressos for every 10 hours," they lamented.

"What happened is our repository crashed - it's the software - it's complicated to explain but it's working in several environments. We had to work hard in order to help the robots step up to a reasonable competition," says Kolberg, who believes the robotics soccer league could one day compete against real human soccer players.

"On the third game we started making goals. But it was too late for us," he tells ISRAEL21c. "The people - professors and faculty and students really understand what we've done in a short time and it was a great honor for Israel. It won't be the last game we play," concludes Kolberg, who reported a practice session against a Turkish robotics soccer team.

Next year, they'll be back -- hopefully for a win. If not in the real life World Cup, than with their robots.