Deployed
I got the word that I will be deployed to Biloxi, MS on Thursday. My initial reaction was nervousness and fear. But as the time to leave approached I become more comfortable. I also learned that 3 Mercury co-workers will be deployed to the same area, which set my mind at ease.Flying into the Gulf Port airport, I was able to see a few houses out of the window. A lot of them had blue roofs and I was wondering about why they had painted them that color. As I got closer I realized that it wasn't paint but tarp. At the airport I met Paul, a young filmmaking instructor from NYU. Being the only two young people waiting for the Red Cross shuttle, we naturally made a connection. My first new friend.
We arrived at the volunteer shelter around 6pm. It was on a huge naval base in Gulf Port, called the NCBC (Naval Construction Batallion something) base. But most people called it the "Seabee
" base, and there was this monument of a angry looking bee holding a machine gun next to our compound. And this shelter is literally a compond. It's a huge hanger-like structure with 4 open rooms. It currently houses 800 volunteers and a total of 1300 people, but it has capacity for over 2000. Volunteers sleep side-by-side on cots. Pretty comfortable. In general the camp has everything you could ask for: running hot water, relatively clean port-o-potties, showers. The food is amazing. The Red Cross contracted a catering company from California to feed the volunteers. The company typically feed firefighters, and correspondingly prepared meals based on a 6000 calorie/day diet! Needless to say you get plenty of food. Best of all, they have a full vegetarian selection, so I was very happy.
The shelter has a lot of amenities. There is a TV area, phones, and huge fans and AC systems keeping it really comfortable. They have social events like square dancing, live bands, and plays. There is a drop-off laundry service, with a 24 hour turnaround time. They even fold your clothes for you. Amazing. I
was really impressed with how well the Red Cross takes care of its volunteers. The demographic breakdown: mostly white, elderly people. Some number of blacks and hispanics, a handful of Asians. I found one other Indian, an uncle for Illinois. Everyone is super friendly and all smiles. I find myself randomly introducing myself to anyone, which I rarely do. But that's the spirit. The seniors are very interesting. Many of them are retirees that have made a second career of service. They travel around assiting in disasters like Katrina all the time. I met one really nice and intelligent old lady from Maryland name K.C. She described a lot of her experiences so far: seeing dead bodies on top of strip malls, 2 feet of maggots in stores from rotting flesh, etc.
K.C. works in financial services, and so she was talking about how Red Cross distributes financial aid to victims. She complained how there was no consistent audit trail to keep
track of fraud which was a huge problem. I tried to give her a complicated computer scientist answer, but I told her all they really needed was Microsoft Excel. Distribution of money was based on family size. The payout was roughly $360 per family member, with a cap of $1575. And this was a one-time payout. She said it was a mystery how some of the families could survive on so little for all these weeks. She related some of the problems with FEMA's efforts. They had a precence, but they didn't come prepared. There is no leadership to handle practical problems of logistics. For example, they have a fleet of 800 vehicles for use in relief work, but nothing set up to maintain the vehicles, coordinate their use, etc. Some FEMA workers had stopped wearing identification around for fear of being shot at. She said that the problem with Red Cross was that it was "run by a bunch of old ladies" that couldn't move quick enough to keep up with the changing situation. There was a constant communication problem between the field and central command on such things as standardization. There was also in-fighting between chapters about who should work on what, and it was getting political. In general the situtation has become so hard because of the magnitude of the disaster.
Tomorrow I will see that with my own eyes
We arrived at the volunteer shelter around 6pm. It was on a huge naval base in Gulf Port, called the NCBC (Naval Construction Batallion something) base. But most people called it the "Seabee
" base, and there was this monument of a angry looking bee holding a machine gun next to our compound. And this shelter is literally a compond. It's a huge hanger-like structure with 4 open rooms. It currently houses 800 volunteers and a total of 1300 people, but it has capacity for over 2000. Volunteers sleep side-by-side on cots. Pretty comfortable. In general the camp has everything you could ask for: running hot water, relatively clean port-o-potties, showers. The food is amazing. The Red Cross contracted a catering company from California to feed the volunteers. The company typically feed firefighters, and correspondingly prepared meals based on a 6000 calorie/day diet! Needless to say you get plenty of food. Best of all, they have a full vegetarian selection, so I was very happy.The shelter has a lot of amenities. There is a TV area, phones, and huge fans and AC systems keeping it really comfortable. They have social events like square dancing, live bands, and plays. There is a drop-off laundry service, with a 24 hour turnaround time. They even fold your clothes for you. Amazing. I
was really impressed with how well the Red Cross takes care of its volunteers. The demographic breakdown: mostly white, elderly people. Some number of blacks and hispanics, a handful of Asians. I found one other Indian, an uncle for Illinois. Everyone is super friendly and all smiles. I find myself randomly introducing myself to anyone, which I rarely do. But that's the spirit. The seniors are very interesting. Many of them are retirees that have made a second career of service. They travel around assiting in disasters like Katrina all the time. I met one really nice and intelligent old lady from Maryland name K.C. She described a lot of her experiences so far: seeing dead bodies on top of strip malls, 2 feet of maggots in stores from rotting flesh, etc.K.C. works in financial services, and so she was talking about how Red Cross distributes financial aid to victims. She complained how there was no consistent audit trail to keep
track of fraud which was a huge problem. I tried to give her a complicated computer scientist answer, but I told her all they really needed was Microsoft Excel. Distribution of money was based on family size. The payout was roughly $360 per family member, with a cap of $1575. And this was a one-time payout. She said it was a mystery how some of the families could survive on so little for all these weeks. She related some of the problems with FEMA's efforts. They had a precence, but they didn't come prepared. There is no leadership to handle practical problems of logistics. For example, they have a fleet of 800 vehicles for use in relief work, but nothing set up to maintain the vehicles, coordinate their use, etc. Some FEMA workers had stopped wearing identification around for fear of being shot at. She said that the problem with Red Cross was that it was "run by a bunch of old ladies" that couldn't move quick enough to keep up with the changing situation. There was a constant communication problem between the field and central command on such things as standardization. There was also in-fighting between chapters about who should work on what, and it was getting political. In general the situtation has become so hard because of the magnitude of the disaster.Tomorrow I will see that with my own eyes
posted by Neil Patel at 7:10 PM
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