(April 19, 2016 - by Ed Van Herik and Harold Goerzen)  A team of four doctors traveled to Ecuador’s devastated coastal region today (April 19) to help care for some of the 2,500 people hurt during last weekend’s devastating quake.

Another 20,000 are homeless, and more than 480 people are confirmed dead, but this total is expected to rise in the coming days. A magnitude-7.8 quake rocked the region at about 7 p.m. local time Saturday, April 16.

The initial crew, comprising four Quito-based physicians, will serve at the healthcare facility, Hospital Juan Carlos Guasti, in the coastal city of Atacames. “The hospital is receiving a lot of trauma patients,” said Reach Beyond missionary Hermann Schirmacher, a veteran of disaster response trips to Ecuador in 2008 and Haiti in 2010.

“We are organizing relief missions as quickly as we can,” said Steve Johnson, executive director of communications at Reach Beyond in Colorado Springs, Colo. “Roads were destroyed and communications equipment has been badly damaged in many areas, making it difficult to find out where help is most needed.”

Dr. Jack Peña, an orthopedic surgeon, is accompanying the team that also includes emergency physician Dr. Hugo Espejo and family physicians Drs. Steve Nelson and Joe Martin. After attending to trauma patients at Atacames, the team plans to move to Ecuadorian communities farther down the coast toward the quake’s epicenter, including hard-hit Muisne.

Reach Beyond’s 76-bed Hospital Vozandes-Quito in the capital city is also receiving patients being airlifted by the Ecuadorian government from coastal towns and cities.

The ministry’s workers throughout the country confirmed that they are safe, though they are concerned for the quake victims who continue to endure hundreds of aftershocks.

Anabella Cabezas, media director for Latin America and a member of the Reach Beyond Board of Trustees, said she learned today that the wife of Quichua radio programmer Franklin Ruchi lost five family members in devastated Pedernales.

Meanwhile, the ministry’s local radio stations and repeaters in Ecuador—seven in all, including three in the quake zone—are broadcasting a message of hope to the traumatized population.

“Our repeater in Portoviejo, which is a place that suffered a lot of damage, is on the air and we have a listener who has confirmed that,” said engineer Geoff Kooistra, director of services for media in Latin America. “We have linked to all government notifications and have done our own special live programming a few times, giving news updates and praying for the situation and offering messages of hope from the Bible.”

“We’ve also interacted with our listeners via Facebook, Twitter and SMS,” added Cabezas. “A radio team will travel to Manta and/or Esmeraldas in the near future to encourage our listeners in those locations.”

Donations to help recovery efforts can be made at www.reachbeyond.org/ecuadorrelief.

Sources: In Christ Communications, Reach Beyond