Volunteer jumped at the chance to help the Red Cross

EVERETT — David Alcorda’s volunteer work is one disaster after another. Literally.

Alcorda, 65, is a client assistance supervisor and part of the Snohomish County Red Cross disaster relief program. Considered the second wave when disaster strikes, client assistance volunteers help disaster victims after they are out of immediate danger.

The work is demanding. Alcorda is one of 27 Snohomish County Red Cross disaster relief volunteers ready at a moment’s notice to be deployed anywhere in the U.S. when disaster strikes.

“I have a bag always packed and ready to go,” Alcorda said. “Once you get the call, you have 24 hours to be on a plane to wherever you’re needed.”

Alcorda’s life of chasing disasters started in 2004, when an earthquake off the Indonesian coast triggered a series of 100-foot-tall tsunamis, killing more than 225,000 people around the Indian Ocean. The retired social worker was stunned by the loss of life.

That is when he decided to “get off the couch” and do something about it.

“The Red Cross was looking for volunteers in the newspaper,” Alcorda said. “After my wife showed me the ad, I went to the Snohomish County Red Cross and signed up.”

According to Red Cross disaster volunteer coordinator Kimberly MacArthur, relief workers like Alcorda receive training in treating lots of injured people, providing them shelter and following their cases and assessing damage to their property.

“When a disaster occurs, a volunteer will call me and tell me they are ready to go,” MacArthur said. “Their name is submitted to the national Red Cross, and they send back an e-mail saying where they are going and what they will be doing when they get there.”

His first deployment would be the most trying — Alcorda was sent to New Orleans in the wake of Hurricane Katrina in September 2005.

“We responded two weeks after the main flooding occurred, there was still loss of life and the smells — the smells were still there,” Alcorda said. “I found Katrina to be highly emotional because the deaths and the devastation were greater than anything we have ever experienced.”

While in New Orleans, Alcorda was given a military escort. The situation on the ground was dangerous; small riots and shootings were commonplace. Yet despite the violence and the horror, Alcorda says the people he met were grateful for his help. Disasters bring out the best and the worst in people, and with Hurricane Katrina, it was amplified, he said.

Just when he thought he was finished with Hurricane Katrina, Hurricane Rita struck Texas on Sept. 24, 2005. Alcorda grabbed his bag, rented a car and drove to Texas to help with Red Cross disaster relief efforts.

During his three years as a disaster relief volunteer, Alcorda has crisscrossed the U.S. responding to various disasters.

Sometimes the images stay with him, haunting him.

“The first thing you see is rubble, broken trees and tree branches piled on the side of the road. The familiar sight of blue tarps over broken windows and covering where a roof has been blown clean off,” Alcorda said. “The standing water with dead animals; dogs, cats, horses. Clouds of mosquitoes. Inside the house there is the smell of mold, broken appliances are everywhere, mixed with the glass from broken family pictures.”

Some people stay with their houses regardless of the conditions. Alcorda was deployed for nearly two weeks in early August to Brownsville, Texas, for Hurricane Dolly and was shocked to find so many people staying in their homes.

“Most worry about looting, so people will stay to protect what they have — even when it isn’t that much,” Alcorda said.

Hurricane Dolly was different for Alcorda. What he saw “tugged on my heart.”

“The situation was quite sad because these folks were low-income with as many as 12 people to a family living in these small trailers, 98 percent of whom were Hispanic,” Alctorta said. “It was very hard to see.”

He is continually impressed by the spirit shown by disaster victims.

“Whenever I say I’m sorry for what has happened, they will say, ‘Thank you, but there is someone who got it worse than me,’ ” Alcorda said. “They try to help one another when they can, and are so grateful for a simple bottle of water or a sandwich. It gives you hope.”

As other Red Cross volunteers are handling Hurricane Gustav, Alcorda is taking a break, taking time to “deprogram” between disasters. It is necessary for the disaster relief volunteers to recuperate mentally and emotionally, he said.

“I’m still a little raw from what I saw in Texas,” Alcorda said. “But should there be another need, another disaster, I’ll be ready.”

Reporter Justin Arnold: 425-339-3432 or jarnold@heraldnet.com

Get involved

For more information on the Snohomish County Red Cross or to learn how to become a disaster relief volunteer, call 425-252-4103.