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The American Red Cross is here to help make sure you are Red Cross Ready with three basic actions : 1) Get a kit, 2) Make a plan and 3) Be informed. From a tiny vial to a large disaster preparedness presentation, we are in the community every day, preparing people for any emergency that may arise. Make sure your community is Red Cross Ready! Request a presentation or volunteer to give a disaster preparedness presentation with one click of your mouse! If you have been affected by a fire or other disaster, contact the Red Cross at 414-345-8678. Every year, 70,000 volunteers offer their time and talents to help the American Red Cross respond to disasters such as hurricanes, floods, earthquakes, fires or other situations that cause human suffering. Join their ranks today! Volunteer! For more information on how to become a volunteer, visit our Disaster Training page. A Red Cross disaster response focuses on meeting people's immediate emergency disaster-caused needs. When a disaster threatens or strikes, the Red Cross provides shelter, food, and health and mental health services to address basic human needs. Disaster Action Team (DAT) members are volunteers who provide immediate emergency services to those affected by a disaster. Typically, a disaster is a fire in a single family home, but the DAT also respond to large-scale disasters such as floods and tornadoes. In addition to distributing blankets, clothing, toiletries and other necessary items to people who have experienced a fire, our volunteers
help people find a place to stay and food to eat. Our DAT responded to more than 450 emergencies last year. If you would like to join our volunteer family, contact us today! In times of disaster, Red Cross provides urgent and preventive health services to disaster victims and workers at Red Cross service delivery facilities or other setting where requested. Disaster Mental Health Service workers provide brief counseling to disaster victims and other workers. Disaster Mental Health Services staff are all mental health professionals who provide intervention during a time of disaster and direct long term needs to local mental health providers. Through Disaster Welfare Information, Red Cross provides a means of establishing contact between disaster victims and their family members. This service is provided when disaster-caused displacement of people or disruption of normal communication channels precludes direct communication. Red Cross provides disaster assistance to individuals or families on a case-by-case basis. Mass Care provides direct services such as sheltering, feeding and distribution of essential personal items to victims of a disaster. Mass Care works with large numbers of people simultaneously until other individual arrangements can be made With an emergency support network operating in approximately 1,000 chapters across the nation and more than 100 military installations around the world, the American Red Cross is prepared to respond when local armed forces members and their families need to communicate in times of personal crises. When a service member is away from home, regular communication with his or her loved ones is extremely important. When that communication is broken or an emergency situation occurs, the Red Cross acts as an intermediary, contacting the service member’s base to help ensure that information is shared with all those concerned. When a critical incident, illness, death or other emergency occurs within a U.S. service member’s family, the American Red Cross is there to help. Specifically, the Red Cross will verify an emergency, send a report of the emergency to military authorities and inform the service member. The military will then decide whether to grant a leave. The emergency leave services of the American Red Cross are available 24 hours a day, 365 days a year to service members on bases throughout the world. If a member of the armed forces has questions regarding his or her benefits, that person can turn to the Red Cross for help. Through our military benefits program, our caseworkers provide information and guidance concerning benefits available to military members and their families. When financial emergencies arise in the family of a service member, Red Cross can offer guidance. After notification, our caseworkers contact service members to inquire about financial difficulties. We help resolve problems, working with military aid societies to provide financial assistance. The Red Cross can provide counseling and instruct families how to get needed documents when family situations require compassionate reassignment or hardship discharge. The Red Cross provides information and referrals linking military families with community resources and services that can help meet their special needs. The members of the International Red Cross Movement, including the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent (Federation), and national societies like the American Red Cross, work together toward common goals during times of crisis or disaster. |
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By taking some time now to make an emergency preparedness kit and family communication plan, you will make it much easier on yourself and your loved ones if a disaster or other emergency were to happen, whether it is a tornado, fire or even a power outage caused by a storm. Not only will you be better able to respond, but you may experience less physical, financial and emotional strain caused by the emergency. 
To reach a Service to the Armed Forces Caseworker, call toll-free 1-800-696-3873. Please do not email requests to this web site.
