Waiting for the next disaster

Monroe-Even before you get a chance to ask a question, Bob Mahran motions you over to his computer. He's logged onto the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Web page, which shows a map of Hurricane Rita roiling toward the Texas coast from the Gulf of Mexico. But Mahran points to the right of the map, where out in the Atlantic there's a swirling mass of clouds forming off the Carolinas. "That's what I'm worry about, not Rita," Mahran said. Mahran, 75 and an emergency medical technician from Monroe, has just returned from his 16th and latest assignment as a Red Cross volunteer. He was dispatched on the day Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast. He spent five days overseeing the medical needs of 528 people at a shelter set up in a school in Mount Herman, La. Besides the school, there's a firehouse, a few homes and not much else and it's hard to find Mount Herman on a map. "Oxford Depot would be the next big city," Mahran said, making the comparison to the hamlet in the town of Blooming Grove. Although there are some local residents in the shelter, most have come the 75 miles or so from New Orleans. Mahran doesn't quite know how they made it, considering the damage to roads, the lack of transportation and just the havoc wrought by Katrina. Whatever belongings they have are stored beneath the cots they sleep on. "Most of the locals could see the light at the end of the tunnel," Mahran said. "The others couldn't see the tunnel." There was no power, and the weather was hot and humid with temperatures near 100 degrees Fahrenheit. There was no phone service, so it was difficult to stay in touch or to request additional supplies. "I was just like the mothers," Mahran recalled. "They ran out of diapers. I ran out of diapers." Mahran talks like that. He keeps it light for the most part, doesn't dwell on any hardship, letting facts speak for themselves. The first day he arrived at the shelter, he worked with a nurse overseeing the health needs of the men and women and children in the shelter. She was dispatched to another assignment elsewhere the next day so that left things in Mahran's hands. He went about the business he's trained for. He dispensed ready-to-eat meals and first aid while the supplies lasted and compassion the rest of the time. A can of bug spray was rationed. A good number of people complained of heart attacks. Mahran said they were actually having anxiety attacks. When people ran out of insulin or other prescriptions, Mahran would try to get those medicines through nearby doctors or hospitals. Except there were no doctors nearby and to reach the hospitals, he had to contact the fire department to use its radio to call an ambulance. There was one woman at the shelter who was complaining about back pains. She had been scheduled for surgery on the day Katrina struck the area. She never made it to the hospital and the pre-op pain killers she was prescribed ran out. "It reached a point where all I could say to someone was ‘I can't give you anything,'" Mahran said. "And they still said thank you." Mahran first became involved with the Red Cross as a teenager in Hoboken, N.J., when he was certified as a lifeguard. Retired from IBM, he became involved in the Red Cross disaster services about 20 years ago. It made sense, he said, because as an engineer, he understood damage assessment. "The Red Cross works so well in situations like this because everyone has a small job to do," Mahran said, "and they do it well. That's why it comes together." It's those details that matter, too, he said, whether it's obtaining the money for the flags that draped the coffins of some of those who died in the World Trade Center attacks or the assistance given just two weeks ago to families burned out of their condos in Monroe. But there's something more. He recalled a time when he was running a Red Cross food service operation in West Virginia where the people who came to the shelter had, like those in Louisiana, had lost much of everything. Mahran was serving a hot meal that also included two pieces of bread. He remembered one person on the line offering the bread to someone else, saying, "I don't need it. I have enough." If you ask Mahran why he does what he does, he says simply: "I feel good about it, but God did not tell me to do this. A fireman risks his life. I don't. I know I can do the work." The conversation ends with a hand shake. And Bob Mahran is off again, this time to deliver cots for use at the Orange County Firemen's Parade in Monroe the next day. As always, Bob Mahran is preparing.