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| Memorial at the Emergency Management Institute. |
Hello all. I am currently writing this post in the dining hall of my new home, which the Maritime College in New York. All 21 FEMA Corps teams from Vicksburg have been deployed to New York City, and all FEMA Corps teams from Vinton Iowa have been deployed to New Jersey. Much has happened in the past few weeks. First of, a few days before Sandy hit we headed from Atlanta Georgia to Emmitsburg Maryland to the Emergency Management Institute. We did some training there to refresh our memory of what to do as a Community Relations Specialist. We stayed there for almost a week, and finally headed out to New York, where we immediately started doing Community Relations- where you walk round and encourage people to register with FEMA. Then we found out that all of us will be living on the ship for the duration of our deployment. After the first day of working as community relations my team assumed our role as supporters of the local Disaster Recovery Center. We are working in The Rockaways- an area that was hit hard by the disaster and where the fires occurred It was heartbreaking to see the area of burnt homes. Almost everyone we talk to is displaced from their home. We have been working 12 hour days every day of the week, so it is very taxing physically, mentally and emotionally. However I am glad I can be of some help and a pair of ears that will listen to these survivors' stories.
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Our team stayed here for "Staging" of Sandy. We waited until Sandy was over to head to NY
Our team visited Gettysburg. |
