DAT teams, comfort kits, and fires oh my!

It's been a very busy couple of days for the Greater Salt Lake Area Chapter. Our Disaster Action Teams have been hard at work responding to multiple apartment fires that have left many families homeless and without any of their possessions.

DAT members have given out numerous teddy bears and hygiene products and have been working around the clock to make sure all of the people affected have a place to stay and enough food to eat.

Let us know if you would like to join a Disaster Action Team, or donate to your local response fund so that we can continue to help those who lose everything due to a fire or other emergency. Also, make sure you and your family know what to do in the event of a fire in your own home.

And check out the media coverage below on two of the fires from last week.

Meet AmeriCorps Volunteer Darran Zenger!

Darran Zenger works diligently everyday at the Greater Salt Lake Area Chapter of the American Red Cross. He has been a volunteer in the office since February and began as a part-time AmeriCorps volunteer in April, spending his time recruiting volunteers who are interested in becoming First Aid/CPR/AED Instructors and scheduling instructors to teach these classes. With his help the Preparedness, Health and Safety Department makes for a well-oiled machine.


As Darran works at his desk each morning, Archer, a yellow lab stays attentively by his side. Darran lives with a condition called Usher Syndrome, which is characterized as progressive vision loss due to Retinitis pigmentosa and deafness. This has caused Darran to be profoundly deaf and legally blind. Archer, his guide dog, has been with Darran since July 2008 and makes life and traveling much easier.

Everyday poses a different battle for Darran; whether it’s finding and purchasing a phone system so he can effectively communicate with the volunteers he works with or trying arduously to make sure there is a teacher for the life-saving skills classes taught at the Red Cross. But, he takes on these battles with energy and enthusiasm and gets the job done. Not once has Darran said “I can’t do this.” Instead, he says, “I can do more” with the proper resources. That drive alone has fueled many of us at the chapter to find ways to do more.

His greatest challenge; “Showing people that I CAN work; I CAN do the job with reasonable accommodations,” Darran says. Misconceptions about what it means to be deaf-blind have caused some concern for Darran. “Most people who think of someone who is deaf-blind, think of Helen Keller, someone who is totally deaf and totally blind, but there is a wide degree of deaf-blindness,” he says.
Darran has done nothing but overcome these challenges and the struggles he has faced practically all his life, due to his condition. He graduated from high school in Oregon where he spent his childhood. He moved to Utah ten years ago and received a degree in Psychology from Utah State in 2004. Married for 12 years, Darran has three kids, a son who is eleven and two daughters, nine and three.

He loves volunteering at the Red Cross, “The co-workers are awesome and I thoroughly enjoy working with everyone.” Darran brings tremendous energy to the office and is an inspiring member of the Red Cross and AmeriCorps team; plus he’s giving us all sign language lessons for free!

Volunteer Picnic!

Last night we had our annual Volunteer Picnic. It was great to see new faces and meet more of the people who are doing fantastic work for the Red Cross, for free!

I just posted pictures on our Flickr group page. Check out the fun times we had last night and thank you to all for coming and celebrating our fabulous volunteers. Without you all, the Red Cross would crumble!

Volunteer says Samoans helped with tsunami relief

Villages were decimated, dozens killed and life dramatically, horribly changed for the people of Samoa and American Samoa.

It could have been a time of emotional devastation for the locals, a time of anger and grief over the loss, but instead, a Utah volunteer who went there to help described it as a great demonstration of generosity.

"The people are overwhelming," said Utah Red Cross volunteer Stan Rosenzweig.

"Their village was almost totally destroyed … they were terribly beat up, but that was the first thing to come out — their people wanted to help us help others."

Rosenzweig returned to his Salt Lake home this past weekend as part of a contingent of local Red Cross volunteers who put their own lives on hold to help the countries ravaged by an 8.0-magnitude earthquake in September that was followed by tsunami waves.

The group spent three weeks there and in just the first couple of days helped put up 1,600 yurt-style tents to provide the victims with temporary shelter.

They also brought along a bevy of food, including 20-pound bags of rice, tuna fish, noodles, milk and basic daily supplies such as diapers, towels, and sheets.

The volunteers worked side by side with villagers to attempt to restore some sense of normalcy.

Amid the 14-hour days, sleeping on cots and enduring the hot temperatures and relentless mosquitoes, Rosenzweig said he was struck most by the humble generosity of the villagers.

"They were in a tremendous amount of pain — they had loved ones killed, but they wanted most to help the people next to them … They are enormously wonderful people with good hearts."

Rosenzweig said he was inspired to become a Red Cross volunteer after Hurricane Katrina.

"I wanted to help — it got me into action."

He and his Red Cross colleagues meet each month to map out response strategies and train for emergencies, having seen firsthand that being prepared can help break or make a community when it comes to wide-scale disasters.

The spirit of the Red Cross, too, is what drives him, adding that it is a "pay it forward" philosophy.

"We know when the 7.6 earthquake comes to the Wasatch Front, our brothers and sisters in the Red Cross will be there for us."

http://www.deseretnews.com/article/705339461/Volunteer-lauds-tsunami-victims.html

Salt Lake Red Cross Volunteer has Stories to Tell - October 1, 2008

American Red Cross disaster volunteer Todd Hansen of Salt Lake City spends his day driving an Emergency Response Vehicle on two routes in Galveston, Texas. One route takes him into the center of the city and the other takes him over to the West Island where many middle class homes and some fine homes were destroyed. He is handing out food, water and cleaning kits to people affected by Hurricane Ike. Hansen said, “Everywhere you look you see heaps of materials and debris that used to be houses.” He said he loves his job helping people, “I love what I do, I am so glad that I can help these people, we are serving the people who need us the most. You would not believe how grateful people are, when we drive by in our Red Cross vehicle, they wave and yell at us, ‘We love the Red Cross.’ They take photos and movies of us doing our jobs, handing out food, waters and cleaning kits.”

Hansen is one of 30 Red Cross disaster trained Utahns who has gone to the Gulf to help this hurricane season. He was trained and deployed by the Greater Salt Lake Area Chapter of the American Red Cross.