Longtime Pennsylvania Red Cross Volunteer Helping Flood Victims in Kentucky

By: Nicole Roschella

More than a dozen Red Crossers from the Greater Pennsylvania Region are currently volunteering in eastern Kentucky, bringing help and hope to flood victims. 

Virginia “Jinny” Borek, of Williamsport, was one of the first volunteers from Pennsylvania to deploy to Kentucky, just one day after the catastrophic flooding on July 28. Borek drives a Red Cross Emergency Response Vehicle (ERV), a truck that enables volunteers to provide food and supplies to people affected by disasters.

“We took meals up to Jenny Wiley State Resort Park where people are staying in shelters. The road to the lodge building was flooded so we had to take the food out of our ERV and load everything onto a bus to drive through the water, which was up to the top of the wheels,” Borek said. “That was at lunchtime. By dinnertime, the water had come up even higher, and we had to use pontoon boats to take up the meals.”

August 3, 2022. Jenny Wiley State Park, Kentucky.
American Red Cross volunteers board the boat that will ferry them across a flooded roadway to deliver meals to those affected by the Kentucky flooding disaster. American Red Cross feeding teams brought prepared hot meals to the site in Emergency Response Vehicles, ferried them across the flooded roadways by boat, and then loaded them onto waiting trucks on the other side for delivery. Photos by Kevin Suttlehan/American Red Cross

 
The next day, Borek and her team traveled to Hazard, Kentucky, a city of about 5,000 at the center of the flooding.
 
“There’s plenty of muddy water around,” Borek said. Her team navigated around closed roads, picked up barbecue from a local business and parked in a shopping center to give out meals.
 
“The people are so nice,” Borek said, “so friendly and so helpful and resilient – especially the ones who have lost everything.”
 
Borek said a lot of people stop to thank Red Crossers and other responders for coming to help, “Any time you walk into a store or get gas, people thank you for being there.”

August 3, 2022. Virgie, Kentucky.
A homeowner attempts make-shift repairs on the bridge leading to his home after the Kentucky flood disaster. American Red Cross Disaster Assessment teams go house-to-house, documenting the extent of the damage to develop the most effective recovery plan for those affected. Photo by Kevin Suttlehan/American Red Cross

Borek has volunteered with the Red Cross for the past 18 years and served on more than a dozen deployments to national disasters. This is her second trip to Kentucky in less than a year. She spent three weeks in Western Kentucky, helping people affected by the deadly late-season tornado outbreak in December 2021.
 
As for what keeps her going back and continuing to volunteer with the Red Cross, Borek simply said, “I just want to help people. They need it.”