Chicago Red Cross volunteers back in Florida for Milton, with area already battered by Helene
CHICAGO (CBS) -- The American Red Cross has sent another round of volunteers to the Gulf Coast of Florida for Hurricane Milton.
Some Red Cross volunteers from Chicago have already arrived in Florida. But with a ground stop at Tampa International Airport, there has been a temporary pause on putting any more people on planes until the storm passes.
This comes just two weeks after others deployed from Chicago to help with Hurricane Helene.
CBS News Chicago caught up with Pattie Eakin, who is now back at her Mount Prospect home after two weeks helping people at a Red Cross shelter north of Tampa for Helene.
Eakin said the damage from Hurricane Helene was more than she could imagine, and she worked overnights to keep people as comfortable as possible. But she says her biggest job was to sit and listen to people talk about their rescues by airboat, and about the loss of their homes and possessions.
It is a situation in which even more Chicagoans will soon find themselves as they volunteer to now help with Hurricane Milton—in an area that's still cleaning up from Helene.
"I really don't think you can really understand it till you're there," Eakin said. "I don't think you can really, really understand the devastation."
The Red Cross is all ready to do whatever needs to be done for those who will find themselves in need again.
"We're ready. We prepared people prior to Helene. We had people prepared and ready prior to Milton," said Joy Squier, director of communications for the American Red Cross, "and if we need to, we'll do it again."
Eakin said she is back home in Mount Prospect to rest and recharge, but she is already planning to volunteer for another deployment.
Eakin's daughter is a nurse in St. Petersburg, Florida, who is now worried about her own home and whether it will make it through the storm.
"Just everybody is down there just helping, and the efforts are just something I couldn't, I didn't understand till I saw it in action," Eakin said.
Meanwhile, emotions took over as CBS News Chicago Photojournalist Lou Kleinberg saw his sister Lisa and mother Carole on a Zoom call Wednesday—for the first time since they decided to pack up and leave their homes in Sarasota, Florida.
Lisa and Carole Kleinberg made their way from Sarasota to a friend's house outside Atlanta, Georgia. But not everyone in the family evacuated.
"My son refuses to come with us," said Lisa Kleinberg. "He declines to come."
Lisa Kleinberg's son is staying with a friend away from the water, but he is right where the eye is coming through, the Kleinbergs said.
They are already anticipating flooding, power outages, and problems with cell phone service—and the lingering cleanup from Hurricane Helene could turn these piles of damage into flying debris.
Some of the Kleinbergs had to evacuate because their homes are in Zone A—close to the water. The Red Cross said their latest numbers show they already have 32,000 people in shelters.