Hands On Disaster Response is now All Hands Volunteers

Kansas Update – Friday May 11, 2007

After two days of being on the ground here in Greensburg, KS I have the pleasure of saying that relief efforts here are quite good and at this time HODR will not be deploying.

We spent yesterday afternoon meeting with some of the local officials, offering our assistance to the police, fire & public service workers and assessing the damage. After our morning meetings we spent the rest of the afternoon helping an older couple “The Mars” do some salvage work on their property. His home will likely be bulldozed and it made little sense to move his entire destroyed garage to the curb by hand… but he had tools that were in his garage that meant something too him, so we dug all afternoon to find them.

Greensburg is a very small “City” of a little over 1,000 people. Luckily only a handful of people were killed or injured when a massive tornado literally wiped out over 90% of the city. Almost all of the homes that were damaged suffered massive wind damage. This is not like Biloxi where there are lots of homes that will be needing gutting, or “by hand” debris removal work. The structures are not livable and will most likely be torn down.

Also, it seems that all of the people we’ve spoken to or heard of had insurance and are getting their claims settled pretty quickly. Once the homeowners have had the chance to sort through the debris to find their possessions they’re signing off on the right of entry for the government to come on and clear the lots like they did in Biloxi.

One concern from the major relief agencies here and local officials is the number of “spontaneous volunteers” who are eager to show up and help. As we are “spontaneous volunteers” I usually have a bias to ignore this message. Being here on the ground, seeing the destruction & the relief efforts though… this time I think I’d agree with them. As big as this Tornado was, it cuts a pretty surgical path, leaving the resources and structure of neighboring towns in tact. What spare rooms and resources these tiny (200 Residents or so) have are being used by the residents who are out of their homes or by the relief workers who are already here. More people showing up would actually begin to put a burden on these small communities.

The Armey Corp. of Engineers are here with large equipment and a number of relief agencies, like Samaritan’s Purse, The Mennanites, Etc. are here with 25-50 Skilled volunteers with Heavy Equipment. With the size of the volunteer force and heavy equipment that is already here… it won’t be all that long before the 500 or so houses have been cleared and prepped for building.

At only about a dozen streets long and several deep, the town is being well covered with relief. Salvation Army and other Non-Profits have Distribution Centers set-up. There are several feeding stations for relief workers and residents. As we worked on the Mars Residence yesterday afternoon, 2 teams of Red Cross nurses came by to make sure we all had proper shots & immunizations and a good dozen mobile food trucks came by offering cold water, hot food, sunscreen, etc. I think the taste left in a lot of the relief worker’s mouths after Katrina has helped to bring out efforts in force for this disaster, and it helps having a small area to serve.

I will be here into next week and HODR will continue to have one of our project managers here on the ground keeping us posted on the situation for the next few weeks. There could be a chance that after the large debris removal work is done HODR will find a good fit for our volunteers to help with some rebuilding efforts or general community rebuilding support like with playgrounds, social centers, etc. Thank you for your continued support and interest in volunteering.

Darius A Monsef

Operations Director, HODR

Kansas Update – Wednesday May 9th, 2007

We just arrived here in Kansas and will be assessing the situation in Greensburg tomorrow. Although the scale of devastation for Greensburg is massive (95% Destroyed Buildings), the total population is only a few thousands. At this point we’re not sure this will be a full scale deployment for us, but since we have had such a strong response from our volunteers we’ve decided to head in and check out what our volunteers could do to help. With such a large percentage of homes destroyed, most of the more likely will be helping families salvage what they can from what was once their homes.

We have been in communication with a large number of the local officials and churches. We will have more of an update by Fri. afternoon what the level of response from HODR will be for this disaster and when and were we’ll be able to take volunteers.

Cheers,
-Darius