Two busloads full with members of Maryland Task Force 1 returned to Rockville, Maryland, on Thursday, after spending two weeks assisting victims of Hurricane Helene.
Tired search and rescue workers unloaded their bags from the belly of the buses and then into the warehouse that serves as headquarters for the search and rescue team, which is made up of members from several Maryland jurisdictions and D.C.
The team began its work in Georgia, before FEMA reassigned them to North Carolina.
Josh Kurland, a captain with Montgomery County Fire and Rescue Service, was the task force leader for the deployment.
“One of the biggest challenges was something we call ‘strainers,’ where there’s large debris piles caught on bridges or trees,” he said. “We did a bunch of work with our K-9s, both on boats and on land, delayering and using our K-9s to clear areas and determine whether there was any human scent in those areas.”
While other teams rescued trapped residents, Maryland Task Force 1’s tasks included helping remove debris from homes and businesses and bolstering the infrastructure.
“In Valdosta, there was a ton of trees, so it was more of a wind event in Valdosta, so just driving was a problem,” Kurland said. “Operating in North Carolina, it was definitely more of a flood operation.”
Task force member Nathan Wondimu said he’d never seen such a level of resilience from natural disaster victims.
“The sense of community in those areas, they were all supporting each other.”
Asked how victims whose lives had been turned upside down by Hurricane Helene were coping, Wondimu said, “The ones who did lose an insurmountable amount that none of us could imagine, they were just grateful to be there in the first place, and present.”
While the task force team that responded for Hurricane Helene has returned home, other members of the 45-person team were deployed to assist after Hurricane Milton.
Get breaking news and daily headlines delivered to your email inbox by signing up here.
© 2024 WTOP. All Rights Reserved. This website is not intended for users located within the European Economic Area.
