Students send innovative aid to disaster-hit region

It took less than an hour for Bai Haoran, a junior student at Tongji University in Shanghai, and his classmate Zhang Wanlin to deliver a mobile power box to a collection point in the city's Pudong New Area on Monday.

It marked the last step of a five-day process during which he and his classmates made the power box to aid relief work in quake-hit areas of Turkiye.

Monday was the delivery deadline for domestic donations together with other relief supplies, which would be sent to Turkiye by air.

Two earthquakes, measuring 7.8 and 7.5 in magnitude, struck nine hours apart in southeastern Turkiye and northern Syria on Feb 6. Scores of strong aftershocks added to the damage as more than 6,000 buildings collapsed. The death toll has climbed past 30,000, and millions have been made homeless.

On Feb 9, Bai, who majors in building electricity and intelligence at the Sino-German College of Applied Sciences of Tongji University, learned that the earthquake-stricken area urgently needed mobile power.

"We took classes on photovoltaics and energy storage last semester and thought we might design a power box to aid the post-quake rescue and recovery work," said Bai.

The 20-year-old had a brief discussion with his classmate Zhang, and a seven-strong research and development team was set up.

Since the new semester had not started, most of the students had not returned to school. The team was divided into online and offline groups.

Bai and Zhang, who both live in Shanghai, were responsible for the offline purchases and assembly of the power box. Other students online shared ideas for the design, compilation of equipment instructions and user manuals in Chinese and English, and were responsible for communication with the Turkish contact person for donations.

Though portable power boxes are available on the market, Bai said their design is tailor-made as they have taken into consideration local sunshine and disaster relief needs to determine the power, capacity, size and other parameters of photovoltaics and batteries.

The team decided the best use of the power box, which weighs around 15 kilograms and is equipped with a 10-watt LED light bulb, was for it to be able to provide 30 to 40 straight hours of light if fully recharged.

"That should guarantee the power box to be a reliable light source for a whole night even if it can't be fully charged when the sunshine is not enough in the day," Bai said.

"Each module can be used alone or as a set, which can meet the requirements of flexibility and portability."

Their teachers also offered advice whenever the team encountered difficulties, Bai added.

They included a manual in Turkish, with the assistance of a student from Turkmenistan.

On Monday morning, after running the power box through its last trial, Bai and Zhang had it packed and delivered. When the volunteer at the storage site posted the sign "humanitarian donation" on the package, Bai said, "It was worth the hard work over the past few days."

"We felt very touched by the sight of Chinese and Turkish national flags at the storage house," Bai continued. "You come to realize what the common community of mankind means."