Correction and update

Thank goodness, yesterday's bad news proved to be simply misinformation. DH went to the airport where he, his colleagues, and about 20 ambulances from this city and from small towns all around the region waited for three hours for the planes full of refugees to arrive. Rumors circulated about the delays and the condition of the passengers, but in the end ... nothing. Officials sent everybody home yesterday afternoon with no clear timeline on when the hurricane victims would actually arrive.

A frustrating waste of resources, sure (especially the ambulances -- these tiny West Texas towns can't afford to lend out indefinitely what, in many cases, is their only ambulance), but at least the two dead passengers rumor proved untrue.

Everyone went back today, and the planes finally came. DH called me after unloading the first two; as many as four or five more planes full are expected. He said they hadn't seen any serious illnesses or death so far, but that the experience still ranks as the most sobering and sad of his life: These people have nothing, he told me, but limp garbage bags filled with their few possessions; everything and anything else they may have once owned is lost. They are lost.

He said didn't know when he'd be home, but it might be after my sister (who is here on sabbatical) leaves at 10:30pm to volunteer overnight with the Red Cross. If I didn't have the two little girls to look after, I'd go too.


~RCH~