This editor’s note highlights the key facts and market implications behind “Helferschwein Helps Wherever There Is Need”, with emphasis on sourcing, product fit, fabrication, logistics, or buyer impact.
"A company had also set up containers with showers for 300 helpers, but the district administration didn't want that, and they had to be removed again after a short time," fumes Hoyler, who also speaks of an "above-average suicide rate in the area." In Walporzheim, he saw how volunteers were providing food to elderly people who still don't have a proper roof over their heads. That, too, "shook him deeply."
The Moosinning association Helferschwein supports those in need both far away and close to home. Moosinning – The Moosinning association Helferschwein, led by its energetic chairman Harry Hoyler, is currently active on many fronts. Most recently, he was in the Ahr valley with a relief truck, and early next week another 40-ton truck will roll into Ukraine.
Harry Hoyler sits on the forklift and lifts hospital and children's beds into a truck already half-filled with food. "It will be full soon, then we're off to Ukraine again," he says, then tells how he has just returned from the Ahr valley. It is "terrible" there – still. Even a good year after the devastating flood, "it looks as if bombs have hit. The people feel abandoned."
He did not want to believe that tens of millions in donations are sitting in the accounts of aid organizations, not being paid out. “These so-called aid organizations are waiting to see if the insurance companies pay, the insurance companies are waiting to see if funds flow – so one points at the other, and the people there are the ones who suffer,” grumbles the man from Eichenried.
Hoyler set off for the Ahr valley with a few friends – with a 40-ton truck made available by the company Damböck – full of building materials donated by Hasit (spray concrete and joint mortar) and Baustoffe Auer (tile adhesive). Local entrepreneurs had set up warehouses where donated relief goods were to be distributed, but some of these had to be dismantled again on the instructions of the district.
What also leaves him speechless: “Two days after the flood, many Chinese were out and about with suitcases of money, a notary in tow, trying to buy land. Unbelievable!”
He needed some time to process the impressions: "We were all shocked that something like this is possible in Germany." In Erbstadt, they unloaded the building materials, which were stored in a Mercedes car dealership, "and people can take what they need there." But that was only the first part of the Helferschwein mission.
An acquaintance, Rüdiger "Brocki" Brockmann, and his wife Katharina, had established contact with the St. Joseph Brothers' Hospital in Paderborn. Among other things, hospital beds were standing there that had to be disposed of because they no longer meet German standards. "So we got twelve hospital beds, emergency stretchers, children's beds, nightstands, and mattresses for Ukraine," Hoyler recounts. "All of that is now going directly to the front-line areas, where there are many wounded soldiers and also old, sick people." In addition, other relief goods will be on board again.
He is visibly moved as he tells how great the willingness to donate still is. "The Hap Ki Do Club Lechfeld, for example, sent food worth a good 5000 euros, the Freisinger Land e.V. masses of canned preserves, and the company Januschkowetz a pallet of razors," he cites a few examples.
It is very important to Hoyler to point out that the Helferschwein e.V. is not only thinking of Ukraine. "This year alone we have already donated around 40,000 euros to organizations in the surrounding area," he explicitly emphasizes. Among others to: Lichtblick Hasenbergl, Stiftung Kinderklinik Schwabing, Ein Herz für Rentner e.V., Schneiderhof Gnadenhof, Aktion Brücke – Obdachlosenküche, Stiftung Schneekristalle, Elterninitiative Krebskranke Kinder, the Erdinger Anzeiger reader campaign Licht in die Herzen, and various Lions Clubs.
“We will of course not neglect our actual core business,” promises the association chairman, who is already thinking about the next relief transport to the Ahr valley. “Winter is just around the corner, and most people there still have neither windows in their houses, let alone functioning heating,” knows Hoyler, who is most upset that decision-makers keep talking about ‘unbureaucratic aid,’ but in the end nothing happens. “‘Unbureaucratic’ is my non-word of the year,” he grumbles. “One passes the buck to the other.”
Towels, blankets, and bedding are urgently needed in the flood area. As they are, by the way, in Ukraine, where according to Hoyler it also comes on top that "the Russians are destroying the power supply everywhere during their retreat." So it is clear to him that the people there, besides beds, medical equipment, sleeping bags, and blankets, "above all need warm winter clothing."
He wants to collect these things soon and bring them to Ukraine in October – and perhaps go to the Ahr valley once more before that.
