Cyclone keeps local in Asia

A Newport-Irvine Rotary Club member has been stranded at an airport in Bangkok, Thailand, for several days en route to Myanmar as the Southeast Asian country reels from the effects of a devastating cyclone, rotary club officials said Wednesday.

Local Rotarian J.T. Warring was on his way to Myanmar to visit several orphanages on a Rotary-sponsored trip when Cyclone Nargis struck the Irrawaddy delta on the western coast of the country late Friday.

The death toll from the storm could spiral past 100,000, a top U.S. official reportedly estimated Wednesday. U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice asked the military junta that runs Myanmar to allow foreign aid into the country to help deal with the growing humanitarian crisis.

“I’m assuming he’ll continue on to the orphanages he’s working with and see what we can do to help,” said John Brainerd, governor of Rotary International Dist. 5320, which includes Orange County.

Area Rotary clubs, including members of Newport-Irvine, have teamed up with Rotarians in Indiana, Kentucky and Thailand to fund safe drinking water at several orphanages in Myanmar.

“[Warring’s] passion is working with children, and providing clean drinking water is one of the Rotary’s top priorities,” said Diane Pearce, president of the Newport-Irvine Rotary Club.

Warring has worked hard to raise money for the orphanages in Myanmar by traveling and speaking about the project with numerous rotary clubs, Pearce said.

The program began after Warring began searching for ways to bring help to the nation in the wake of the December 2004 tsunami that killed hundreds of thousands of people across Southeast Asia, Brainerd said.

The military junta that runs Myanmar kicked Rotary International out of the country in the 1970s. Rotary members saw Warring’s project to help orphanages there as an ideal way to help in the region because of their low-profile. The orphanages tend to be in out-of-the-way places that attract little attention from the military.

“Orphanages tend to be a little under the radar of the junta,” Brainerd said. “The junta described us [Rotary International] as a subversive organization — spies essentially.”

Most of the orphanages the program has helped already are out of the region hardest hit by the storm, but many are in rural areas in flimsy make-shift buildings, said Brainerd, who visited the country a few years ago.

“You can’t believe the level of poverty — one orphanage was just a bunch of sticks slapped together with no real roof,” he said. “If it was in the path of that cyclone, it would be gone right now.”

Local Rotarians have funded clean drinking water systems at five orphanages in Myanmar and have plans to complete nine more this year.

Program organizers hope to build 65 more wells to bring clean drinking water to Myanmar orphans in the next few years.

The last time Brainerd heard from Warring, there was no electricity in the airport but he did have occasional access to e-mail, Brainerd said. Attempts to reach Warring in Thailand were unsuccessful Wednesday.

Rotary International

Send donations for Rotary International efforts in Myanmar to the

5320 Rotary Charitable Foundation, 2245 N. Glassell Ave. Orange, CA 92865-2701. Make a note on checks indicating the donation is for orphanages in Myanmar.

Saint Michael & All Angels Episcopal Parish Church

The church will take a special offering Sunday for cyclone victims in Myanmar. For more information, call the church at (949) 644-0463.

Fairview Community Church

The church, at 2525 Fairview Road, Costa Mesa, is collecting donations for cyclone victims for American Baptist International Ministries and United Church of Christ. Call (714) 545-4610. Indicate donations are for cyclone relief.

BRIANNA BAILEY may be reached at (714) 966-4625 or at brianna.bailey@latimes.com.