Palmdale Relief Convoy Delivers the Goods : Florida: Truckers arrive with 40 tons of supplies for those left homeless and jobless by Hurricane Andrew.

A mercy mission organized by federal aviation workers in the Antelope Valley came full circle Friday, when weary truckers delivered more than 40 tons of relief supplies to South Florida colleagues who lost their homes and jobs to Hurricane Andrew.

In an anti-climactic finish to a bruising three-day cross-country run, two freight-liners quietly pulled into this makeshift military encampment 12 hours apart; a third truck with 22 or so more tons had gotten lost somewhere in South Florida but finally arrived at 8:30 p.m.

There were no brass bands or cheers when the first 18-wheeler arrived at 3 a.m. and the second came in the late afternoon.

But throughout the day, dedicated volunteers worked to get the supplies moving to those in need.

They set about unloading, sorting and distributing the supplies--and, because some of the volunteers were also made homeless by the disaster, taking some for themselves.

More than 160 Federal Aviation Administration workers were forced out of their houses by the effect of the hurricane damage and scores more who work as air traffic controllers at this commercial airport suffered lesser damages to their homes, cars and property.

Yet dozens of them worked throughout the day and evening Friday to get the supplies unpacked so that others could benefit.

“I’m just giving a hand,” said Mike Nunez, 37, an FAA employee whose house near the airport, and office at the airport, were leveled. “I could be at my house trying to clean it out, but it’s no use. So I’m here instead.”

After the Aug. 24 hurricane, FAA workers at Tamiami issued a call for help, and employees at federal aviation facilities nationwide answered it. FAA installations from Raleigh, N.C.; Oklahoma City and Kansas City, Mo., responded with truckloads of supplies, said relief coordinator Al Osborn.

But no one responded quite like the FAA folks in Palmdale, who with the help of local Air Force employees spearheaded an effort to raise supplies from well-wishers throughout Southern California, Osborn said.

He paused for a moment to wipe his brow late Friday, and just looked at the mountains of supplies. He said goods from Palmdale accounted for almost half the supplies that were at the informal FAA relief depot Friday.

But it wasn’t the quantity of supplies that made the California mother lode so special. It was the quality, he said.

“We’re just continuing to discover how wonderful this load really is,” Osborn marveled. “I see stuff here I didn’t even know came in cans.”

It was well into the evening, and volunteers around Osborn continued to battle stifling heat and swarms of mosquitoes to put the goods away. In a nearby tent set up amid the ruined remains of several airplanes, one FAA employee whose house was lost had come across an unexpected treasure while unpacking--hair spray and cosmetics.

“Finally,” exclaimed Kelly Barth. “Somebody remembered we want to feel like ladies again!”

Indeed, the well-wishers from California had remembered a lot of things that could have been easily forgotten in a relief effort. Among the goodies hauled in Friday by the truckers were the usual staples of canned goods, clothes and toiletries. But also included were teddy bears for the kids, suntan lotion and bug spray, hair care products and clotheslines.

“Those clotheslines are hot, hot, hot--people still don’t have electricity” for clothes dryers, said FAA air traffic controller Charles Robinson.

“The shipment from California was the most thoughtful one we’ve gotten,” he told a fellow volunteer. “There’s a lot of stuff here we haven’t seen yet.”

James and Frieda Goins were the first members of the Palmdale convoy to reach Tamiami Airport, rolling in in their rig about 3 a.m. Friday.

“Let’s put it this way, we didn’t waste too much time,” James Goins said when asked how he crossed the country in just 52 hours. “We didn’t want them waiting on us. We wanted to wait on them.”

The Goins rarely stopped, not even to change drivers. With the cruise control on, he would slip out of the driver’s seat as his wife took the wheel. “We never lose a minute that way,” he said.

Memories of devastated communities in South Carolina, where James Goins delivered relief supplies after Hurricane Hugo, kept him going. “I wanted to get here as quick as we could. I’m glad we did now. I think we did the right thing.”

The unloading began at dawn and took until 10 a.m. Baby food and medicine were whisked off in vans while volunteers still sorted the clothes and other less urgent items.

Canvas canopies were erected near the wreckage of dozens of planes to house the goods. The area soon became a sort of impromptu bazaar, where hurricane victims went from one presorted carton to another selecting canned foods, baby items and other necessities.

“Most of us, we take what we need, and we help,” said air traffic controller Kalicharan. “I’m taking very little. Others need it more.”

Some of the “shoppers” were unconnected to the FAA.

Ana Lopez, 19, heard about the relief effort through a friend, and had stuffed her car trunk with baby food and formula for her infant son and daughter, who played among the cans nearby.

“The roof went off my house,” she said in Spanish. “This will help a lot.”

So much came from California that some of the largess was taken elsewhere. Several tons of it had been collected by federal corrections employees in Western states and those supplies were trucked off to a Bureau of Prisons repository nearby as part of a similar relief effort.

Other items went to those in need who couldn’t leave their homes to pick it up at the airport.

FAA volunteer Greg Gish, like a modern-day Santa Claus, left the relief center with a flatbed truck loaded with supplies and spent much of the day zipping from place to place to deliver them where they were needed.

At Jamie Snow’s house in East Perrine, Gish dropped off some Fruit Loops for Snow’s infant daughter. At the Cutler Ridge Baptist Church and a nursing home nearby, he left a huge pile of canned goods and toilet paper.

Most of the actual distribution of the supplies is set for today, after all the volunteers have had a chance to rest a bit from all the unloading.

As she took a breather late Friday, Carolyn Brown said there was a silver lining to Hurricane Andrew’s horrible wrath, one that taught her something about the better side of human nature and about her colleagues here and in Palmdale.

“We’re all on the same level now,” she said. “We’re all helping each other, and learning to accept help from each other. It has brought us closer together.”

VALLEY CHILDREN HELP HOMELESS: B3