STEVE INSKEEP, Host:
NPR's Adam Hochberg has more.
ADAM HOCHBERG: The Toussaint Louverture airport in Port-au-Prince is one of Haiti's few remaining lifelines to the rest of the world. Since Wednesday, it's been struggling to accommodate planes filled with supplies, relief workers and volunteers - but it has been doing so under the most primitive conditions. There is no electricity, the air traffic control system is down, and pilots who have been using the airport say damage there is severe.
RICK HALLQUIST: It's beyond anything I have ever seen.
HOCHBERG: Rick Hallquist is a pilot for Missionary Flights International, a Christian relief organization based in Florida. For the past few days, he has been flying DC-3s into Port-au-Prince, shuttling in volunteers and supplies to an airport that's barely usable.
HALLQUIST: The tower is still standing, structurally, but the windows are blown out, so I'm sure there's anybody operating up there. Besides that, the airport terminal building is pretty compromised. There's a lot of cracks in the walls. There's people working inside but they're pretty much trying to limit their exposure inside the building.
HOCHBERG: Barry Ellis runs a charter service called Hop-A-Jet that's been flying doctors in from Miami. He says the situation was chaotic and sometimes exasperating.
BARRY ELLIS: Everybody that's trying to go in there, rightfully so, believes that they should have priority. Some airplanes have blood on board, they have doctors on board. So, it's initially very frustrating to a lot of the airplane, and therefore creates a hectic situation trying to get in there.
HOCHBERG: Rajiv Shah, who's coordinating the U.S. government's relief efforts, said restoring normal airport operations is a high priority.
RAJIV SHAH: We're maximizing our ability to get planes in there, to unload them, and to move them forward. There are going to be times when things do get jammed up there, but we're moving them as fast as we possibly can.
HOCHBERG: Adam Hochberg, NPR News.