Photos: Relief efforts continue

Photos by Steve Earley

Marines from Weapons Company, Battalion Landing Team 3/2, 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, land near the town of Cotes de Fer to set up a landing zone on Thursday. They helicoptered in from the Bataan to set up a distribution center for relief supplies for the day.

First Lt. Jason Mangone of Weapons Company, Battalion Landing Team 3/2, 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, raises his arms to move back the crowd at the landing zone near Cotes de Fer, on the southern coast of Haiti, on Thursday.

Marines from Weapons Company, Battalion Landing Team 3/2, 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, visit an elementary school that is being used as a hospital near Cotes de Fer, on the southern coast of Haiti, on Thursday. Reconnaissance reports had indicated little damage to the town, but when the Marines arrived they found a refugee village with 3,000 people and the makeshift hospital with 23 patients but no doctors or medicine.

A Marine from Weapons Company, Battalion Landing Team 3/2, 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, keeps the crowd away from the landing zone in Cotes de Fer, Haiti, as they prepare to deliver relief aid on Thursday.

Marines from Weapons Company, Battalion Landing Team 3/2, 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, load cases of bottled water and biscuits to aid workers at a landing zone near Cotes de Fer, on the southern coast of Haiti, on Thursday.

Marines from Weapons Company, Battalion Landing Team 3/2, 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, give out bottled water and biscuits to Haitians at a landing zone near Cotes de Fer, on the southern coast of Haiti, on Thursday.

Cpl. Jonathan Rodriguez of Weapons Company, Battalion Landing Team 3/2, 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, laughs as Joseph Poyon, right, tries to teach him some Creole phrases at the landing zone near CTMtes De Fer on the south coast of Haiti on Thursday.

Marines from Weapons Company, Battalion Landing Team 3/2, 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit duck to avoid the rotor wash from a CH-53E Super Stallion helicopter at a landing zone near Cotes de Fer, on the southern coast of Haiti, on Thursday.

Two young Haitian girls wait for Marines from Weapons Company, Battalion Landing Team 3/2, 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, at a landing zone near Cotes de Fer ,on the southern coast of Haiti, on Thursday.

Marines from Weapons Company, Battalion Landing Team 3/2, 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, found a refugee village with 3,000 people when they arrived at a landing zone near Cotes de Fer, on the southern coast of Haiti, on Thursday.

Townspeople watch at the edge of a landing zone as Marines from Weapons Company, Battalion Landing Team 3/2, 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, helicopter out of a landing zone Thursday.

One of three CH-53E Super Stallion helicopters carrying 111 Marines from Weapons Company, Battalion Landing Team 3/2, 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, on the Bataan flies through the mountains in southern Haiti on Thursday, as the unit returns from Cotes De Fer.

Lance Cpl. John Hercules, a Haitian native, was brought in to translate during the relief effort by Weapons Company, Battalion Landing Team 3/2, 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit. He explained to the townspeople that the Marines were coming just for the day to deliver relief supplies to Cotes de Fer, on the south coast of Haiti.

Capt. Edmund Clayton of Weapons Company, Battalion Landing Team 3/2, 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, visits a makeshift hospital next to the refugee camp near Cotes De Fer, Haiti, on Thursday. Clayton visited the site and hospital to collect information for future relief efforts.

A Marine from Weapons Company, Battalion Landing Team 3/2, 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit sleeps Thursday as he waits to be taken to a new landing zone near Cotes de Fer, on the south coast of Haiti. CH-53E Super Stallion helicopters carried the Marines from the Bataan to drop off relief supplies.

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