Red Cross Makes Urgent Ask for Hurricane Volunteers
WARWICK, RI — Peter Prowe of Pawtuxet Village, a Red Cross volunteer, is home from aiding Hurricane Helene relief in Florida, where more hurricane volunteers are needed to aid people fatigued from three hurricanes in 15 months.
The Red Cross’s manpower has also been tested. The American Red Cross in Rhode Island has issued an urgent appeal for volunteers willing to support emergency shelters for local and national disaster relief efforts.
In emergency shelters, Red Cross hurricane volunteers provide people with a safe place to stay, necessities like food and water, and critical services like mental health support and basic health services such as replacing lost medications or medical equipment. Interested hurricane volunteers are urged to sign up today at redcross.org/volunteer, the Red Cross announced.
All candidates must complete necessary training and be able to commit to a two-week deployment. Applicants who don’t have disaster experience, but have supervision, management or organization skills; a strong desire to help others; and the ability to thrive in a fast-paced, dynamic environment, are encouraged to apply.
About 1,300 Red Cross disaster responders are currently on the ground across 10 states devastated by Hurricane Helene in the Southeast, including hard-hit North Carolina, Tennessee, Georgia and Florida. So far, more than 30 volunteers from the Red Cross Connecticut and Rhode Island Region have been deployed to the Hurricane Helene disaster relief operation.
Prowe, a Community Volunteer Leader for the CT/RI Region of the American Red Cross, was part of a team deployed pre-landfall for Hurricane Helene in northern Florida. Such teams are placed in threatened areas ahead of storms because it’s easier to get resources to the area in advance of a hurricane than it is to get them there after infrastructure has been damaged or flooded.
Prowe was part of a team of six managing an Evacuation Shelter at an elementary school in Live Oak, FL. The Red Cross manned about 30 of the shelters from Tampa and northern Florida.
“Evacuation shelters are for residents to stay during a hurricane, providing a safe place to stay until the storm passes. The school Prowe and his colleauges were in was built to Florida hurricane standards. It can withstand winds up to 150 MPH, has metal window shutters, and has a backup generator. I’m told winds hit 140 mph,” Prowe said.
Even so, the hurricane was not easily ignored.
“It’s a lot of wind and it makes a lot of noise,” Prowe added.
Inside the shelter, he and his team assembled crates for dogs and other pets kept there, helped the facility’s nurse deal with medical emergencies and organized distribution of water for people. Evacuation Shelters are only meant to be used for a few days, so food and other long-term supplies aren’t provided.
The area is in a very poor county, he said, with neighborhoods of mobile homes. Helene was the third hurricane they’d endured in 15 months. “A lot of them are getting tired of hurricanes and having to rebuild,” Prowe said.
After the hurricane, the people in the shelter left to return to their homes, some of them no longer there. The Red Cross offered longer-term shelter for people unhoused by the hurricane, he said.
Prowe, “happily retired” after 32 years from his manager of global services group position at FM Global since 2018, is one of the 95 percent volunteer Red Cross staffers in Rhode Island.
“I have the luxury of deploying quite often since I have the time,” Prowe said.
The Red Cross needs more people in Rhode Island with that luxury of time.
“We’re always looking for more volunteers to help out,” Prowse said.
CLIMATE CRISIS THREATS CONTINUE Hurricane season is far from over — and the threat of more storms looms now in the Gulf and Atlantic oceans. What’s more, the Southwest and California are forecast to have above-normal wildfire risk this fall. As the climate crisis worsens, disasters are becoming more intense and frequent — leading the Red Cross to respond on a nearly continuous basis.
HOW TO HELP Beyond becoming a Red Cross volunteer, people can help by making a financial donation. Financial donations are the quickest and fastest way to get help to people who need it. Visit redcross.org or text the word HELENE to 90999 to make a donation to help people affected by Hurricane Helene. Donations enable the Red Cross to prepare for, respond to and help people recover from this disaster.
Rob has worked as reporter and editor for several publications, including The Kent County Daily Times and Coventry Courier, before working for Gatehouse in MA then moving home with Patch Media. Now he's publisher and editor of WarwickPost.com. Contact him at [email protected] with tips, press releases, advertising inquiries, and concerns.