In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, many people felt helpless and alienated. Shaken by the magnitude of the devastation and motivated to do more, Carol Lee Saffioti-Hughes, a recently retired UW-Parkside English professor, visited her local Red Cross office in Racine. There she received disaster training in mass care, which involves distributing bulk care items, sheltering and feeding Red Cross clients.

Saffioti-Hughes began by serving on local disaster relief efforts, such as residential fires and larger disasters like the flooding in Kenosha County this past August. When the California wildfires broke out, Saffioti-Hughes decided to go where she could put her training to good use.

Over 2,000 volunteers from the Midwest, including Saffioti-Hughes, reached California within 48 hours. Upon arrival, she and fellow volunteers immediately found a way to help. The local Red Cross chapter was too small so they cleaned up a temporarily rented building to serve as the headquarters for the disaster relief effort. They then became known as the shower group after volunteering to wash and disinfect 300 cots, a job which helped them form strong team bonds.

After cleaning the cots, Saffioti-Hughes was assigned to a shelter in a little suburban town about an hour from San Diego, where she acted primarily as a Spanish translator. She felt good about using her language skills and learned a lot of Spanish medical vocabulary that will be helpful in future disaster situations. As her ten-day assignment progressed, Saffioti-Hughes saw the relief effort rapidly develop into an efficient system for turning tragedy and confusion into relief. Volunteers continued cleaning and preparing shelters for evacuees while others were assigned to run shelters and assist the residents.

From the very beginning she felt a sense of camaraderie with fellow volunteers. They came from all walks of life and had a wide range of different personalities but they all learned to be flexible and work together to get the job done. Saffioti-Hughes and fellow volunteers were glad to help out and will be right there again when they are needed but still they hope it won’t be too soon or too often. As clarified by Saffioti-Hughes, “When we say goodbye, we say to each other, ‘under other circumstances it wouldn’t make sense to say this, but I hope I never see you again.’”

Saffioti-Hughes finds volunteering inspiring, understanding that every little bit helps and is needed for the success of the overall goals of the relief effort. She plans to attend leadership training courses in the future to help with the team building process in future disaster relief situations. In the near future, she also hopes to apply for international disaster services to help with disaster relief efforts all over the world.