For 25 years, the Rapid Deployment Unit for Salvage Operations Abroad (SEEBA) has stood for THW’s competent and quick help after disasters abroad. Within a few hours after an alert, the SEEBA operational staff and their equipment are ready for their worldwide operations. At the weekend, the 25th anniversary was celebrated at the Centre for Logistics Abroad (ZAL) in Mainz.

At the beginning of the week, the help association International Humanitarian Partnership (IHP) dealt in the city of Remagen near Bonn with current operations in Dolo Ado (Ethiopia) and a previous drinking water treatment mission in Pakistan. Additionally, the results of some IHP-expert groups about topics such as information management or the building of base camps were presented.

On Saturday, THW-Vice-President, Mr Rainer Schwierczinski, and 120 THW volunteers took part in this year’s Steuben Parade in New York. The Steuben Parade belongs to the biggest ceremonies of the Community of ethnic Germans in the USA and pays annual tribute to the contribution of the Prussian General Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben to the American victory in the War of Independence.

On Sunday, THW-President, Mr Albrecht Broemme, took part in several ceremonies in New York to commemorate 11 September 2001. Together with fire fighters from New York, he remembered the dead volunteers. On Friday, Mr Broemme had already given a speech at the College Station/Texas in front of fire fighters.