When mission calls, Stephanie Carter answers

By Peter de Paolo - Red Cross volunteer writer

“I’ve been waiting to do this for 19 years, and now, here I am. I’m able to deploy whenever there’s a need.”

For Maine-based American Red Cross volunteer, Stephanie Carter, the second half of 2024 has been very busy. Starting in June, with a deployment to New Mexico to aid victims of the wildfires that raged through that state, she went onto assignments in Vermont (flooding), Louisiana (hurricane), Southern California (fires), and finally, Asheville, North Carolina, where she helped coordinate staff services in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene. Even after returning home from her last two deployments, she worked virtually for several days to tend to paperwork related to those events.

She readily admits, “After all that, I needed a break.”

Taking a break these days means spending time at her cabin in the Maine woods, tending to her animals and renovating a mobile home in Augusta. Three years ago, she and her husband bought their place sight unseen and moved up from the Washington, D.C. area.

“It’s beautiful here,” she says, “a big difference from D.C.”

Her husband retired soon after their move, and with his support (and the support of the rest of her family as well), she has been able to realize a dream she has thought about since her first Red Cross deployment in 2005.

“There’s core group of people who are continually going out to coordinate these responses. I want to be one of those core people,” she says.

Stephanie’s involvement with the Red Cross goes back to Hurricane Katrina.

“I was home, watching everything on the news, and I was going crazy wanting to help,” she says. “I just felt this pull. I needed to be there.”

She called around to several organizations, churches and pet rescue groups, and was finally contacted by the Red Cross. After a short, intense training session, and with her background in public affairs, she was deployed to Montgomery, Alabama, where she created a newsletter for the many volunteers assisting in that Level 7 response.

Since Katrina, Stephanie has volunteered off and on with the Red Cross in a variety of positions, from providing Client Care services for immediate needs of disaster victims, to distributing meals from a Red Cross ERV (emergency response vehicle), to staffing an overnight shelter during a flooding event last December near her home in Augusta, Maine. She also participated in a simulation of a dirty bomb explosion, helping the Red Cross determine the best way to respond if that situation were to occur.

Of her ERV experience, Stephanie recalls, “We’d drive up and down the roads lined with furniture and piles of drywall, and hand out MREs , water and hot meals. The folks were super grateful. They’re working hard. You pull in, you offer them a meal. That’s one less stress for them.”

On her many deployments, Stephanie has seen her share of heart-wrenching situations. One woman, a victim of a levee break/flood in the Upper Midwest in 2008, has stuck in her mind ever since. The woman, whose life, she later learned, had already been filled with tragedy, was caregiver for her elderly mother and ailing husband, and was able to get everyone on the roof of their home before the floodwaters slammed into it and carried it off of its foundation.

Stephanie recalls getting to know the woman in the days that followed, “She was exhausted. She told me that every time she closed her eyes, she could hear the floodwaters rushing by. We helped her out with mental health services, got new medications for her and her family, and got them a hotel room. Just so much tragedy. Unbelievable.”

Over the years, Stephanie has taken advantage of the Red Cross EDGE (Engagement, Development, Growth, Education) program, acquiring a multitude of skills that she’s been able to put to use in the field.

“I self-educate whenever I feel like it,” she says. “I have lots of GAP (Group/Activity/Position) skills that I’ve earned through EDGE. Then I’ve gone out to see what I like and what I don’t like.”

After all of her experiences, and with her background as an administrative assistant, she’s decided that Staff Services Management is where she feels most comfortable and feels that she can do the most good. She looks forward to working at the management level in the years to come.

“I like supporting the volunteers who deal with the clients,” she says. “If I can make their life easier, make sure they have lodging and transportation, direct them to their supervisor, make sure their mission (credit) cards are working, that’s very satisfying for me.”

An added bonus of Stephanie’s involvement with the Red Cross has been meeting like-minded people whom she now counts as friends. As she explains, “You build relationships with each deployment. You see the same people over and over again, people you just feel connected to.”

Stephanie’s passion for volunteering and for being there for people in need is obvious.

“When people are in these tragic events, we’re there to offer them a blanket and to help get them through those first few days.”

But she has learned that it’s never easy.

“Each event is a learning experience,” she says. “Things are different every time, and that can be overwhelming.”

For now, and for the foreseeable future, Stephanie is focused on helping her fellow volunteers navigate their deployments, so they can better concentrate on the tasks at hand.

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