New York - Part 2

My function in logistics was facilities, which meant that we took care of the headquarters building, and all the buildings we were using. I was assigned to mainly to the headquarters. It was an old office building that had an unused cafeteria. The building was not use to having over a hundred working in it daily, and thousands of volunteers showing up and wanting to help.

We had to add more electrical circuits for all the copiers, fax’s, printers, and computers that we were using. It was decided after 4 days of trying to feed snacks & drinks to all the hundreds of people that were being processed through the building to open the cafeteria. It took us three days to get the old equipment in working order, and get 2 donated refrigerators, and a freezer down to the basement where the cafeteria was located.

There were times we were running around the building resetting circuit breakers, because there were too many printers or copiers on one circuit. We would have to pull one of the pieces of equipment off the circuit until we got another line run to that area.

I didn’t spend all my time at headquarters. There were times that we had to go to Manhattan to get leases signed for buildings that we used. The West Side highway was a four lane street that ran up the side of Manhattan. The first time I was in NY it was only open to dump trucks and emergency vehicles; which Red Cross vehicles were included. Anyway, it was neat to see a dozen people standing on the island between the lanes cheering as the vehicles drove past.

On a day off I did get to walk down Wall St. with a thousand other people and get a glance at was left of the towers. About a week later I had the opportunity to walk through Ground Zero while checking out a facility. You have seen the pictures. It is hard to describe what I saw mounds and mounds of stuff four stories high, and a big hole in the ground. It is a sight I will not forget, but I had to get back to headquarters and get to work.