Travelers rush to get back to Delaware Valley ahead of Hurricane Idalia
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) - It's a reunion in baggage claim.
After a sleepless night, Noreen Petrizzi is overjoyed to see her daughter, Megan, back home ahead of Idalia making landfall.
"I had three flight cancellations, one at 3 o'clock this morning and I've just been jumping through. I had to go to Boston first just to get back," Megan Petrizzi Macungie said.
Petrizzi flew her daughter home – who is a sophomore at the University of South Florida – to get out of the eye of the storm.
Like many – Megan had to scramble to find a flight out of the Sunshine State once Tampa International Airport and other airports closed.
"I'm praying this is the end of it. I'm praying. This is the end of it. One a year. One a year I can handle," Petrizzi said.
However, not everyone is flying out of Florida back home to the Deleware Valley ahead of Idalia.
One Red Cross volunteer from Montgomery County is heading to the Sunshine State before the storm hits.
"I'm headed to Tallahassee. I'm going to pick up a car and drive to Dothan, Alabama where I'm gonna be meeting up with my mechanics," Mary Noll, who is a Red Cross volunteer said.
CBS News Philadelphia chatted with Noll as she sat in Charlotte's airport for a layover.
We spoke w/ Mary during her layover in Charlotte.
— Nikki DeMentri (@nikkidementri) August 29, 2023
Her first deployment with the Red Cross was Hurricane Katrina -- which hit 18 years ago today.
"When people lose everything, they lose hope and I wanna be a part of the hope.”
Her story at 6 on @CBSPhiladelphia. https://t.co/gj4ARh7JpE
It'll soon mark 18 years since she became a volunteer with the Red Cross. Her first deployment was Hurricane Katrina, which hit 18 years ago today.
"When I first saw hurricane Katrina happening I was sitting on a couch at a friend's house in Atlanta, Georgia and I said, what am I doing here when I should be there helping people," Noll said.
The Lower Gwynedd mom is only one of six national fleet operations administrators in the country, so she says often she stays longer on deployments to help those in need.
"The biggest reason I do it is because if it was my family that was affected, I want someone there to take care of them," Noll said. "When people lose everything, they lose hope and I wanna be a part of the hope."
That hope starts with Noll and five other volunteers who are deploying from both the New Jersey and Southeastern Pennsylvania Red Cross chapters to the Sunshine State for Idalia.