{"id":93696,"date":"2017-09-30T09:01:01","date_gmt":"2017-09-30T14:01:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thevwindependent.com\/news\/?p=93696"},"modified":"2017-10-02T07:20:07","modified_gmt":"2017-10-02T12:20:07","slug":"vw-red-cross-volunteer-likes-helping-hurricane-victims","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/2017\/09\/30\/vw-red-cross-volunteer-likes-helping-hurricane-victims\/","title":{"rendered":"Local volunteer helps hurricane victims"},"content":{"rendered":"

DAVE MOSIER\/<\/strong>independent editor<\/em><\/p>\n

Local resident Ed Glossett said his stint as a volunteer American Red Cross disaster worker in Houston following Hurricane Harvey was interesting, but added his Red Cross training helped him cope with the experience.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Local American Red Cross volunteer Ed Glossett (right) with Red Cross CEO Gail McGovern.<\/strong> photo submitted<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Just getting into Houston was a problem, Glossett said. He noted that he and other relief workers had to fly into Louisiana because of the widespread flooding, and then waited there 3-4 days before they could be driven to Houston.<\/p>\n

Even after they began the drive to Houston under a police escort, the buses had to wait outside the city for a night when they failed to get to the city before darkness fell. Because of the flooding, Glossett said vehicles couldn\u2019t go into the city after dark.<\/p>\n

Mark Klausing, local disaster team leader, said Houston is even flatter than Van Wert County, which, when coupled with the desert terrain and hard ground, kept the water from dissipating like it would here. He added that an estimated 6.3 million people needed assistance after Hurricane Harvey devastated the area.<\/p>\n

After Glossett got into Houston, he and other Red Cross workers were first employed setting up a warehouse where bulk supplies could be stored. They then unloaded 16 trailer loads of supplies the Red Cross had already shipped to the city and prepared emergency kits to take to city residents.<\/p>\n

Traffic wasn\u2019t a problem, he added, since most of the city was shut down because of the flooding.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll downtown was closed, it was a ghost town,\u201d Glossett said, noting that it took 2\u00bd weeks for most of the water to recede.<\/p>\n

After setting up the warehouse and making up disaster kits, Glossett said he and other relief workers then took supplies on military vehicles into the city, where residents were patient and friendly, for the most part.<\/p>\n

\u201cTexas is a very friendly state,\u201d he noted. \u201cEveryone was helping everybody else; it didn\u2019t matter, it was really neat.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat was the best experience, seeing a city pulling together like that,\u201d Glossett said.<\/p>\n

The Red Cross volunteer said the language barrier, with Houston having a large population of Spanish-speaking residents, as well as other ethnic groups, such as Filipinos and Koreans, was something that had to be overcome before translators — some of them AmericCorps volunteers — were brought into the city.<\/p>\n

He said that his biggest surprise was what most Houston residents were asking for, in the way of emergency supplies: bug spray and water.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe bugs were a big problem,\u201d Glossett said, noting that there were lots of cockroaches in the city, and mosquitoes were 3-4 times larger than those in Van Wert County.<\/p>\n

The flooding also made it hard to get from one place to another. Klausing said Catherine Reed, another area Red Cross volunteer, said that, while where she slept was only across the street from where she worked in Houston, it took an hour of driving to get there because of high water.<\/p>\n

Derek Stemen, Lima Red Cross chapter executive director, said more Red Cross volunteers are headed for Puerto Rico and Florida to help with the devastation in those s<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the last month, the American Red Cross has launched a wide-ranging relief effort to help people devastated by three historic, back-to-back hurricanes — Harvey, Irma, and Maria,\u201d Stemen said.\u00a0\u201cThe Red Cross is part of a large team of agencies and organizations responding to provide help to communities turned upside down by these three category 4 storms.<\/p>\n

Stemen also noted that the Red Cross is supporting the Mexican Red Cross in its response to recent earthquakes.<\/p>\n

Klausing thanked Glossett for volunteering to help those in Houston who were suffering because of Hurricane Harvey.<\/p>\n

\u201cI commend Ed for giving up his job and his family to take time to go out and do this, that\u2019s amazing,\u201d said Klausing, who added Glossett was being deployed again to Florida this past week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

DAVE MOSIER\/independent editor Local resident Ed Glossett said his stint as a volunteer American Red Cross disaster worker in Houston following Hurricane Harvey was interesting, but added his Red Cross training helped him cope with the experience. Just getting into Houston was a problem, Glossett said. He noted that he and other relief workers had […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-93696","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-21 18:11:26","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93696","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=93696"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93696\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=93696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=93696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=93696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}