'Worst is yet to come': Aussie’s dire warning for Nepal
Steve 'Pineapple' Alberts has just returned home from Nepal, but his work in the quake-ravaged country is far from over.
The Gold Coast father-of-five left Australia after the 7.8 magnitude earthquake claimed more than 8000 lives last month.
He survived the second major tremor on May 12 as he returned to Nepal to continue his work with The Big Umbrella Foundation.
"I smelt death, I saw it. It was like a war with no enemy other than the Earth," Mr Alberts told Yahoo7.
"I went there against everybody’s wishes, my family tried to talk me out of it, but I had a non-refundable ticket so I had to go (laughs), and wish I could have stayed until the rain because there’s so much to do."
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Hundreds gather in Nepal capital to mark one month since quake
Mr Alberts warns the worst is yet to come, with disease, flooding and landslides expected to devastate the region further, as monsoon season hits in the coming weeks.
Senior UN official, Magdy Martinez-Soliman, says the top priority is finding temporary housing for hundreds of thousands of people before then.
"The UN has made a general international appeal worth $AU483 million for its agencies working in Nepal," Mr Martinez-Soliman said.
"The slow response to date is worrying because we are working against the clock and many people are still without permanent shelter."
Last month, Mr Alberts' priority as Director of Sponsorship and Procurement for the Melbourne-based charity - which helps children in one of the world's poorest country get off the streets - was to assess the damage in order to provide rapid relief.
Some of the children are victims of child trafficking, some sold because their parents cannot afford to raise them, and others need help to get off drugs or deal with depression.
CEO and founder of The Big Umbrella Foundation, Justin Dickinson, told Yahoo7 that his organisation owes a lot to social media.
"Facebook is about 90 percent of our promotion. It’s huge we almost only exist on it," Mr Dickinson said.
Once he was on the ground, Mr Alberts saw the need for much more than his initial mission.
Using the power of social media and the support of loved ones, Mr Alberts started a grassroots fundraising campaign, which is now racing against the clock to provide aid to some of the most remote villages in Nepal.
He has ridden in trucks on wild roads for up to eight-hours to deliver much-needed rice, and tarps to inaccessible mountain villages.
"Goats looked at me like 'you’re going up there!?' These areas were amazingly impassable," he said.
Mr Alberts' goal is to raise up to $10,000 in the next week to provide vital shelters, and although he is back in Australia, he's been working hard from his Queensland base.
“In the last 24 hours I’ve organised 23 shelters," he told Yahoo7. "I've still got finger on the pulse and communicating with people on the ground.”
One of the big reasons why Mr Alberts has rushed home is to assist the Dalai Lama as Technical Director on his upcoming tour next week.
His longer-term goal is to help build three new schools in three different villages once the monsoon season ends around September.
"Education is the key for these kids, some of whom walk for four hours to get to school," Mr Alberts said.
"[Education] is so vital to them as individuals, and helping their country grow. They are down because they can’t go to school, and are working in the fields with theirs families."
Forecasters say the extreme heatwave in India is a sign of the coming monsoon, with regions expected to be hit with heavy rains for two to four months.
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