"At times, we were a little overwhelmed by the gratitude shown to us by the people," says David Cooper of a recent disaster response trip to Florida. "We even had an older veteran stand and give us a salute."
Cooper tells of people waving American flags as a Strike Team made up of ambulance crews from different parts of the country made their way into the ravaged coastal areas of south Florida.
Cooper is manager of the Stoddard County Ambulance District (SCAD) and one of five SCAD crew members called to assist with recovery in Florida after Hurricane Irma. Other crew members were Assistant Director Chuck Kasting, EMT Paul Fox, EMT Crystal Gibson and Paramedic John Sanders.
SCAD provided two ambulance units which were part of a Strike Force that assisted the Lower Keys Medical Center in Key West, Fla.
Cooper served as a Strike Team Leader (a Strike Team is made up of five ambulance units). In addition to the two county units, there was a unit from Cape Girardeau, one from Arkansas and one from Ohio in the team led by Cooper. Their main assignment was to transport patients from a hospital in Key West to hospitals in Miami, Fla.
Cooper says while Key West suffered from the hurricane, it was the Middle Keys that took the brunt of the winds. There was plenty of damage in Key West, but the biggest problem when his team arrived was lack of water and electricity. The lab at the hospital was not fully functioning, so patients in need of lab work or other tests were transported to Miami. Critical patients were transported by helicopter.
Cooper notes that the Marathon Key took the brunt of the hurricane, but there was a lot of damage to property all over the Keys.
"We saw a lot of structural damages," Cooper says. "We literally saw boats on the highways."
Cooper has been part of relief efforts before. He and crew members from SCAD responded to Texas twice in recent years -- after Hurricane Gustav in 2002 and Hurricane Ike in 2008.
The local ambulance district was on standby during Hurricane Harvey recovery efforts in Texas, awaiting a call from American Medical Response (AMR). AMR has a national contract with the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) for disaster response. SCAD is a sub-contractor with AMR, but was not called to assist in Texas.
The call to go to Florida came at 10 a.m. on Sept. 9, 2017. Approximately one hour after receiving the call, SCAD had two units on their way to Florida. They arrived first at Tallahassee, Fla., which served as the primary staging area. The local crews were in Tallahassee when what was left of Hurricane Irma, now a tropical storm, passed through. Cooper says they arrived on Tuesday and the storm came through that night between 9 and 10 p.m. He, his crew and other emergency response personnel were in a storm facility at Florida A&M.
Two Strike Teams, including the one headed by Cooper, were sent to Miami for further instructions.
"What was more difficult with this response, compared to others, was that we didn't have the support staff we normally see," says Cooper.
One of the biggest obstacles was finding fuel in Florida. The Florida Highway Patrol worked in conjunction with the emergency response teams to try to locate refueling stations on the trip south. The first fuel stop was outside Orlando. Later fire departments assisted with helping keeping ambulance units fueled and finally tankers arrived to fuel the emergency vehicles.
The SCAD crews arrived in Miami on Sept. 11. After receiving instructions, they were sent to Key West where they were attached to the emergency department at Lower Keys Medical Center.
Residents that remained behind in Key West had no water and no power. Most of the drinking water in the Keys comes from the mainland, Cooper discovered.
The Stoddard County crew spent some nights sleeping in the ambulances, but were provided hospital rooms once they reached Key West. Showers were hard to come by, Cooper laughs. He says at one time they had to avail themselves of the facilities at a truck stop.
"The heat was brutal," says Cooper of relief efforts in the Keys after the hurricane. "It was like southeast Missouri on steroids."
Cooper remembers really sympathizing with the utility linemen who were working to restore power. It was wet, hot and there weren't many conveniences.
The local crew spent one night in cots on a parking lot when their work was finished in Key West and they arrived in Boca Raton, Fla.
"It wasn't bad because we had a breeze," says Cooper.
From there they went to Valdosta, Ga. It was there the crew had their first rooms with running water for showers, a good hot meal and some rest. They also had access to ice, something that Cooper hadn't realized was such a luxury.
In retrospect, Cooper thought recovery efforts went really well.
"This Strike team was one of the best I've ever worked with," states Cooper. "We just really meshed."
After a long and sometimes weary trip, the SCAD crew arrived back in Stoddard County on Sept. 18 with some lasting memories of the people of Florida.
"One women absolutely insisted on paying for our meal," Cooper remembers. "The people were great."