Salvation Army on the ground to provide critical assistance after Helene

The Salvation Army is providing tens of thousands of meals to help survivors of Hurricane Helene make it through the aftermath.

Transcript

00:00Helene is another disaster where the Salvation Army is there to help. They have helped mobilize

00:05operation across five states. And Lori Freed is long-term disaster recovery specialist for the

00:11Salvation Army. Lori, thank you for making time for us here. You're serving such an important

00:16role right now for many families. Well, thank you for having us. We're just honored to have

00:22the opportunity to tell our family story. Lori, what is the situation on the ground

00:28now almost a week after Helene arrived? What kinds of help is still most urgently needed?

00:34Absolutely. Well, I am the incident commander here for the North and South Carolinas

00:38in Hendersonville. And as you can expect, it's devastation across within North and South Carolina.

00:45We have more than 900,000 still without power. And there is just devastation everywhere. The roads,

00:52we've got debris still all over the roads. Families' transportation has been impacted.

00:57Their homes have been impacted. And they're just shook up at this point. So the Salvation

01:02Army is just honored to be able to come alongside those individuals, give them a cold drink, maybe

01:08a warm meal, and show them some hope that there are people out there that love them and support

01:14them and are able to be there to help. So Lori, unfortunately, many people don't

01:20have flood insurance. How is the Salvation Army helping families whose homes were destroyed

01:25with FEMA and other resources? Absolutely. So Salvation Army is really proud too. We've

01:30done over 82,000 meals, and we have more than 65 of our feeding trucks out across those areas

01:37serving people. So our first focus right now is making sure people have a place to stay

01:42and a meal to eat. And so by working with our partners, we're making sure everybody is taken

01:47care of, that they are able to meet those needs. Start working with our partners and educating

01:52individuals about those resources to file for FEMA, to work with their insurance companies

01:58so that they can get all of the access to the resources. But Salvation Army has been in these

02:02communities. We're here before the disasters. We're one of the largest social service agencies

02:07in the world. And so we're going to be here alongside those communities to help them figure

02:12out what those next steps are. And we just hope that we will have the support of those. The best

02:17way to help those individuals is really to make a financial gift. They can go to helpsalvationarmy.org

02:22or 1-800-SALARMY, and we will be able to take those resources and put them to the most use for

02:28those families. Well, this is a long-term recovery, and I know that that's part of what you do.

02:34Lori Freed, long-term disaster recovery specialist with the Salvation Army, realizes it's a marathon,

02:39not a sprint. So thank you for what you're doing and what you'll continue to do in the months to

02:42come. Thank you so much. All right, Lori.