The Israel Defense Forces says it supplied 300 liters of fuel for “urgent medical purposes” at Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, but Hamas prevented the medical center from receiving it.
Early this morning, troops placed the jerrycans near the hospital, as had been coordinated in advance with officials at Shifa.
Waiting for confirmation this actually happened because the article about the premature babies dying due to lack of power asked the doctors if Israel was willing to help to which they responded that “no, Israel isn’t responding to our requests at all, so we don’t know”.
What in the fuck would 70 gallons of fuel do for a hospital? A few hours of power? Is that supposed to be a genuine attempt at aid? Less than $200 of fuel?
Interesting question.
Apparently an ICU bed requires ~200 W of power.
I don’t know the type of fuel or generator, but I found an arbitrary model that can output 1800W, enough for 9 ICU beds. Four liters of gasoline provide 5400Wh, which means they lasts 3 hrs.
So I estimate 300 liters of gasoline could have powered 9 ICU beds for over nine days.
Oh cool, wonder how many ICU beds they have to power. I wonder what other equipment they need.
In any case that’s a pittance. I could’ve provided more personally. A country-like entity could certainly do much better, like maybe just suppling power and not bombing their power infrastructure.
I don’t know how many ICU beds they have to power, but Shifa Hospital has 30 ICU beds in all.
So if all the ICU beds are occupied, then 300 liters of gasoline would power them for two to three days.
I’ve worked in a hospital. During my time there we had a true blackout. Even the central power generator couldn’t turn on, because the connection was chewed through my rats. No one did a check on it like they’re supposed to every month…heads rolled for it.
Here to say, you can’t just power ICU beds in isolation. The circuits for emergency power aren’t just going to beds. They’re open sockets on the wall, any one can plug anything in there. You can’t just redo a circuit in the blink of an eye either. If their central generator died and they get a bunch of gas powered ones, they’ll need a lot of time to figure out where they need to splice the wires in order to supply power but not overwhelm the generators.
It’s safe to say they’re probably going to use their large central generator. It’s probably also safe to say they’re going to power more than the ICU beds. Even if they turned off the heating and cooling, they’re still going to use more than the figure you suggested. Some circuits aren’t optional.
The hospital needs 9000-10000 liters a day of fuel. Do you think there is a single power generator connected to the neonatal unit? How are they going to limit the consumption? It’s not really that easy and I bet most of the electricians also left the hospital… Your napkin math is also not taking into account any power losses, etc.
Plus offering 300 liters is laughable. Seriously, your car’s fuel tank is 60+ liters, so Israel offered them 5 car tanks worth of fuel. How generous and humane of them!
“How are they going to limit consumption” really? Turn off breakers, pull plugs, turn off switches, have an electrician measure, whack everyone who uses power for anything but the absolutely most life critical applications with a large stick…
I am incredibly skeptical of this story, but holy shit this is one of the funniest things I have seen on this site.
- You: Fucking Israel, even if it is true, that is worthless
- Someone else: Actually, if you look at the math that is actually probably really good for a single hospital
- You: Well fuck Israel, I would have donated more personally and they should have done more
Again, I am incredibly skeptical of this story. But I REALLY hope it is true. Mostly because it is a sign of any form of humanity in an inhumane genocide. But partly to see your next act of mental gymnastics. Like, fuck Cirque du Soleil, this is where it is at.
So some anonymous person on the internet did a couple of web searches and some back of the napkin simple multiplication, and suddenly for you that becomes the last word on the subject?
There is a fuckload more in a hospital that needs power in addition to an ICU bed. We don’t know what generators they’re using, the fuel consumed per hour, and how far a minimum power draw can go. We do know that the hospitals are so far over capacity that patients are everyplace, as are people seeking shelter.
It is fuck all for a single hospital.
You’re quite right, some people just cannot see past their biases.
And Hamas taking it for themselves is perfectly believable.
Where’s the mental gymnastics? My initial point is that it’s NOTHING in terms of aid.
And the numbers given are dubious presumptions that assume modern, well kept, thousand dollar generators with modern ICU beds and no other equipment or auxiliary usage. It’s not useful or realistic.
Hey, you asked and they answered. It’s probably a few days of fuel for absolutely mission critical applications, but it’s definitely something.
Sigh. You were doing so well but now you are just down to “fake news, fake news”.
I don’t know how hospital power systems are designed. maybe it’s possible that you could only power infant icus. I doubt it. either the hospital has power or it doesn’t. at least that’s what I would expect. so it’s not a matter of whether you’re just powering icu’s. also fuck israel.
BBC already checked - The hospitals head of surgery said this would be equal to half hour of generator power. Half. Hour.
You seem to be parroting this a bit since I’ve run into it several times now… Do Surgeons magically know how to run electrical these days? Would you take electrical advice or knowledge from a surgeon? Did they specify what they’d be running on the generators?
I can believe that if you run 100% of everything in the hospital on it that it would run out quickly… What about just running the bare minimum? Further… Where’s this magical BBC link? You’ve never linked it but just stated “well they said” repeatedly.
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Disappointing if true
Not saying it’s not true, but I don’t think timesofisrael.com is a particularly unbiased source in this conflict.
Well that explains my phrasing, doesn’t it
And no one is even commenting on the elephant in the room. 300 liters of diesel!
Am I the only one who thinks this is a ridiculously low amount?
BBC confirms the head of surgery on the hospital already mentioned, this is enough for about half an hour of generator power.
It was delivered by Jerry can, by hand from troops in the area. They coordinated the drop with the hospital and apparently Hamas. Presumably if this worked they could have arranged for a more regular supply. But that’s 2 barrels of fuel. You could run quite a bit off that.
Nothing Israel says about Gaza is true.
