Dangerous Minds pal Vinay Gupta just released a new video describing how to build and deploy Hexayurts—cheap, stable housing solutions for disaster or refugee situations—for Haiti. These cost less than $200 and can house a family of eight on a semi-permanant basis. This is a real, tangible solution for the aftermath of the Haitian earthquake—and Science for Humanity needs your help in collecting funding to test and deploy them.

The Hexayurt is a new kind of sheltering solution. To make the simplest hexayurt, make a wall by putting six sheets of plywood on their sides in a hexagon. Cut six more sheets in half diagonally, and screw them together into a shallow cone. Lift the roof on to the wall with a large group of people, then fasten it down with more screws. Seal and paint it for durability. Your basic hexayurt is complete. This shelter will last for years in most climates and costs less than $100. This basic design can be improved with proper windows, doors, room partitions, stove fittings and other architectural features. More durable materials could give it a very long life.

It may be ideal for a variety of disaster relief situations.

Watch the video below—and help test Hexayurts for Haiti here.

(Hexayurt Project)

We can finance stable housing for Haiti for the same money that would otherwise be wasted on disposable relief tents. Check out this document proposing the use of Hexayurts in Haiti I just helped Hexayurt inventor and disaster housing specialist Vinay Gupta put together to see how.

The Hexayurt is a tent for the real world. Relief tents are a lie: they last for a year. By the time the tent has rotted and the people are homeless again, the eyes of the media have moved on to some other disaster, and everybody says the situation is fine. “Transitional sheltering” is supposed to take over from the tents, but it’s always, always, always too little too late. Nobody can afford a thousand bucks a family anyway. Not for all of them. NGOs, being fairly small compared to the size of the problem, generally count the successes rather than the failures anyway.

In Hexayurt Country, we count the dead, and we ask their names, even if all we have left at the end is a picture.

If you put half a million to a million Haitians in tents, a year from now, when all the tents have rotted, how many do you think will have permanent homes again?

A million homeless people. Five people a house. Two hundred thousand homes. Let’s say $1000 each for a transitional shelter. That’s two hundred million dollars - the lion’s share of the pledged support - and that’s on top of $400 per family for the initial tent - another eighty million dollars per million people.

Do we have two hundred and eighty million dollars for rehousing in Haiti before we start taking infrastructure (water, sanitiation etc.) costs into account?

There is not enough money on the table to take care of Haiti. And everybody in the industry knows this

Nobody will tell Joe Donor that they’re sticking a bandaid on a gunshot wound, because then he stops sending money and things get even worse. Lose-lose.

A hexayurt is a hundred bucks of plywood and some screws. Even really poor people can afford that, and you can buy four of them - 12 years of decent shelter, maybe - for the price of a sodding relief tent.

(Vinay Gupta: Hexayurt Country)

(Specs on the Hexayurt)

(Previously on Dangerous Minds: Hexayurts for Haiti)

Vinay Gupta’s Hexayurt, a semi-permanent structure that can be built to house a family of eight from about $100’s worth of cheap material, is a critical solution for the mess in Haiti. If implemented in the current situation, hexayurts can house the brunt of displaced survivors until more permanent aid is forthcoming. Ask your local government and NGO bodies to consider using the hexayurt as part of their relief effort.

The Hexayurt is a new kind of sheltering solution. To make the simplest hexayurt, make a wall by putting six sheets of plywood on their sides in a hexagon. Cut six more sheets in half diagonally, and screw them together into a shallow cone. Lift with a large group on to the wall, and fasten with more screws. This shelter will last for several years and costs less than $100. It may be ideal for a variety of disaster relief situations.

Here are the key points.

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