Local Volunteers Aid Texas Flood Victims

“So many little miracles” is how American Red Cross volunteer Simona Kreitzman described her 10 days in Del Rio, Texas, where Tropical Storm Charley wreaked havoc last month.

Kreitzman, who runs One Stop Videos Brokers in Canoga Park, has volunteered three weeks each year with the Red Cross since 1989. She returned from Texas on Sunday.

In Del Rio, while conducting home visits to evaluate the damage of the storm that raged through the southern areas of the state, Kreitzman learned that most people had no warning of the floods.

One family probably survived, she said, only because the mother had decided to sleep on the floor next to a sick youngster’s bed, and was awakened as soon as the water came in the house. The father was able to grab their children, ages 3, 5 and 7 and climb a tree, while the mother kept her head above water only by hanging onto a passing board.

“I heard these things all day long,” Kreitzman said. “It’s enough to make you cry and marvel at the same time.”

Kreitzman said she prefers “our disasters to theirs.”

“With an earthquake, you can see what is broken and what needs to be fixed,” she said. “These people’s homes are soaked. Their walls are going to have to be pulled down.

“The flood waters were full of sewage and dead animals--any clothes or anything else that got wet is lost.”

After returning from disaster work, hearing people complain about minor problems can be annoying, said Kreitzman.

“I’ll be in a local market and hear one lady telling another, ‘I haven’t got a thing to wear’ ” she said. “I’ll find myself wanting to shout at them, ‘I’ll show you some people who haven’t got a thing to wear!’ ”

Volunteer Lyssa Kerridwynn of Sylmar worked as a family services coordinator in Rio Bravo, Texas, for eight days, returning home Friday.

She has been on Red Cross teams at many flood sites, including those near Fort Collins, Colo., a year ago, but found the situation faced by the families along the Rio Grande River especially heart-rending.

“You’ve got people on minimum wage with eight to 10 kids and already barely making it,” she said. “They don’t need a flood in the middle of all that.”

Kerridwynn has been a Red Cross volunteer for 20 years, since she joined a Red Cross Youth Disaster Action Team at age 14. She said she typically is called out about seven times a year.

Her experience with Red Cross shelters dates back even further, to February 1971, when her family stayed in one after their home was destroyed in the Sylmar earthquake.

Information about Red Cross disaster activities is available at the agency’s Web site at https://redcross.org.