Although areas affected by Hurricanes Helene and Milton are almost 1,400 miles away, the Permian Basin Chapter of the American Red Cross has been pitching in.
Senior Executive Director Tracy Austin said they have sent a couple of people. Volunteers are deployed for two weeks after being trained and processed.
The local chapter has about 60 volunteers and about half of those are actively working on a regular basis.
One of the things they have done is ramped up reunification, particularly because the area is hard to get to.
“We have teams working throughout the country doing a virtual deployment. PJ, who is our disaster program manager, just got off a deployment,” Austin said.
Someone calls her and says they can’t get in touch with someone. One instance that PJ told Austin about was someone had seen their friend’s railing in the river and needed to know if her friend was OK.
They find the area and they start calling places like the Post Office and the grocery store to see if anybody knows that person, or seen them.
“In that case, the friend had been picking up mail from the Post Office. She was OK and we were able to report that back,” Austin said.
“She’s had to tell people that their family members or loved ones have passed … She said inevitably they will tell you thank you for letting me know. It’s better to know than to not know,” she added. “That’s a hard job.”
Austin added that the support is phenomenal for volunteers from mental to medical health.
“They are all volunteers and they’re all certified practitioners, so if they’re mental health, they’ve got that certification for the state that they are in. They call us after we have a deployment, or during a deployment, to check in,” Austin said.
Afterwards, they will call and check on the volunteers depending on their caseloads.
“In the relief realm, there is no easy job,” Austin said.
Volunteers work 12 hours and depending on where they are, sleep in shelters. That means they sleep on a cot in a separate area from the people that are seeking shelter, but your experience is much like theirs.
“Red Crossers are solid, good people who want to make the world better and they want to hep us alleviate human suffering,” Austin said.
Palwasha “PJ” Javed, the chapter’s disaster program manager, was virtually deployed. Part of the employee culture at the Red Cross is everyone deploys when possible.
She has a small child, so she usually chooses virtual deployment. She got into this work through her sister, who was an intern for the Red Cross as part of her degree plan.
“This would be, I think, the third virtual deployment that I’ve done. Before this, I did two weeks for Hurricane Beryl and before that, I did two weeks for the Temple Tornado. This was the first one in reunification,” Javed said.
For this particular disaster, they found that there was a need for reunification. The hours for that were not too bad, she said.
“The first couple of days, training-wise, was not too bad. After that, tasks themselves took four to six hours a day,” but not all at once, Javed said.
Volunteering can get “heavy.” There are nine different Red Cross disaster relief efforts spread across six states, she said. Every operation has close to 500 volunteers and staff.
Javed’s work was based in North and South Carolina. Every operation had different geographical areas they were covering.
“Any kind of volunteering with people who have suffered disaster takes a lot of grit and effort, mentally and emotionally. But I would say that 100% of the time, I felt so supported, because they have disaster mental health services constantly reaching out to you, and they are always checking in. Beyond that, my supervisors, not just in this disaster, but before as well they would always say, if they felt that I had had kind of a hard day, or if I had had to deal with some hard news, they would step in and they would say, you know, maybe this is enough for today. Maybe just take the rest of your day and take care of yourself,” Javed said.
At the end of it, she said, in return for the work you do you sleep well at night knowing you did something good with your time.
“There is such a need for volunteers out there. Whoever your skill set is, whatever your stamina is, if you have two weeks to give, either in person or online, I would definitely say sign up and just see if you can help,” Javed said.
She noted that if you are not available to deploy for this disaster for two weeks, there are other duties in regions across the Permian Basin and Texas where people can help with local activities.
“In an emergency when resources are stretched thin we want to take care of the most emergent need, but we don’t want to usher in things so far back at home that we come back to something neglected,” Javed said.
Victor Moulakis is Javed’s volunteer partner and has been giving of his time since April. He has been taking care of local disasters.
He went to Sanderson after the tornado and has helped out with people displaced by fires and flooding.
“I enjoy helping people. It’s my chance to give back a little bit now that I’m retired and I’ve got the time. I feel like actually doing something worthwhile and helping people in their time of need,” Moulakis said.
He and Austin attend the same church. Austin said they get calls in the wee hours of the morning after a fire.
“Volunteers get out of their comfortable beds and leave their families to go take care of people who’ve been displaced by fire or other disasters. That is really a gift of the spirit. That is a heart gift that they give to our community by being willing to get up in the middle of the night sometimes and make sure people have their needs met,” Austin said.
If you want to volunteer
Join the American Red Cross in preventing and alleviating human suffering in the face of disasters. Expedited training is available and all travel costs are covered.
To learn more, visit redcross.org or contact [email protected]
