A powerful earthquake struck Haiti with an epicentre roughly 25 kilometres west of Port-au-Prince, collapsing the presidential palace, the national cathedral and the headquarters of the United Nations mission in the country.
Casualty estimates ran into the hundreds of thousands, and well over a million people were left without shelter. Damaged roads, a crippled port and a limited airport made the delivery of water, medical supplies and heavy equipment extremely difficult in the first week.
Pledges of reconstruction aid exceeded $9bn, but disbursement was slow and a cholera outbreak later that year compounded the crisis, becoming one of the largest in modern history.
