Area Red Cross volunteers return from Katrina duty

L. David Fleming of Dexter, Mo., spent the last two weeks in Baton Rouge, La., living in a church gym with 300 people.

Every day Fleming, one of four American Red Cross volunteers from Southeast Missouri to go down to the hurricane-affected areas, drove out to assess home damage from Hurricane Katrina.

Kristi Thurman, American Red Cross emergency service director, said the three volunteers who went down around the same time as Fleming have also returned.

Tina Pattengill of Scott City, another American Red Cross volunteer, was first in the Miami, Fla., area, then ended up helping at shelters in Nacogdoches, Texas, and Lufkin, Texas.

She helped by handing out such things as food and "comfort kits," which held personal care items.

Everyone was grateful, she said. They always said "thank you" or "God bless you" when they walked away.

The people in the shelter also took it upon themselves to do chores like ironing and sweeping the floors to keep themselves busy, Pattengill said.

Fleming spent the most time in Slidell, La. Some of the houses were full of muck, sewage and debris out of Lake Pontchartrain, he said.

"It was worse than going to Haiti on mission trips because there was so much devastation and there was no place to stay, hardly any food or water," he said.

Some of the homes had extensive water damage in addition to wind damage and trees lying on top of them, he said.

"Beautiful homes would just be covered with trees," Fleming said.

Homeowners asked Fleming how much water was in their home and how much damage there was, he said. Many people he talked to had no insurance.

For all the houses that were uninhabitable, there were still some homes in Slidell that, though damaged, could still be lived in, he said.

Fleming said he will return with his church group in a few weeks to hang some Sheetrock in some churches and homes in the affected area.

ameyer@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 127