Missouri Disaster Relief, Week 2

Another busy week in Joplin.  We’re still working long hours in the field clearing debris, but we’re getting a little better at it.

I spent the better part of this week bucking trees and clearing debris.  Well, watching volunteers do these things.  Every day is a frantic mess, but I really love the job.  I’m constantly running around; making sure we have enough work and water for all the volunteers.  I get to spend my time in between shooting the shit and talking to volunteers about their connections to the city.  It rules.

The volunteers are great and there has been a ton of them so far.  We’ve processed 15,000 volunteers in the two weeks since the storm, and there are lots of folks who don’t register and drive the streets handing out food and water.  It has been powerful to see the wave of support for the town.  We had 3000 volunteers last Saturday, which was overwhelming for the 100 of us who were leading them, but too much help is a great problem to have. 

All this positivity has been great, and surprising considering where we're working.  It's tragic to be clearing yards, finding waterlogged photo albums, shattered electronics and destroyed books.  So many things that were once so important and sentimental are now lost among a six mile trash pile.  Somebody told me the other day that there is more debris in Joplin than there was in New York after 9/11.  Difference is, all the debris here came from homes and schools, not offices.  The positivity here has been crucial.

I spent a couple days this week away from field work, doing search and rescue.  Going in, I was terrified.  In my head, that meant finding dead things and resuscitating pets with CPR.  In reality, we were investigating smells. S&R had already completed three complete searches of the tornado zone and I was leading groups in a fourth.  We walked up and down every street and alleyway in our zone, sniffin’ at stuff.  All we found were a couple dead cats and a bunch of rancid food.  Lots of fridges and freezers had been disconnected, and after a week of hot humid weather, any left behind chicken or hamburger starts to smell really putrid.  

Until next time…