 Hey everyone, it's Vinicius, your Community Outreach Specialist, and today I have the pleasure of bringing you Sergeant Medina and Sergeant Famosa. We've both been up in Linhaven, Florida. The video that I brought you guys last week of our men and women deploying to go up, they were with that first group, so they are actually just going to give us an update, talk to us about what's been happening, the resources that they pulled up there, and just give us some information to see how everybody's doing up there. What is the update from Linhaven? What's going on? What have you guys seen? Well, we can tell you from the onset, we left with 15 people. It was two Wednesdays ago, I believe that was an original deployment. When we arrived, that was shortly thereafter, the hurricane hit, which was complete devastation at that point. Our mission upon arrival, once we made contact at Linhaven, we got with the local PD who was establishing their own form of government again. And what I mean by that, that they have to actually keep government going. So even though the PD was completely destroyed, they were able to set up in a lot where we were stationed at, where they actually set up their local government to have their meetings daily, so that keeps that going. Upon our arrival, our first mission was search and recovery. Now you have to imagine, everything's completely destroyed, as far as you can see. And this area unbeknownst to us was heavily populated with trees, very large, old trees that have been there probably for hundreds of years. Now imagine each one of these trees knocked over. Anybody that had a house next to a tree, that house got destroyed. So our first mission was search and recovery, where we actually went with the locals and the local fire department going house to house. If it had any destruction, we would go ahead and then break into the house itself, if we can get in and search the house to make sure that nobody was still trapped within the residence. Fortunately, we were able to find actually two people on the first day. Yes, it really was. And these two women were probably elderly, I would say mid-nineties. Oh wow. Mid-nineties, and they were left there, so thank God we found them and we were able to give them the help and the aid that they needed and got them out of that environment. There's no doubt if we wouldn't have found them due to the temperature that was going on and the way they were stuck in these houses, unfortunately they probably wouldn't have been here. So it's a very good feeling to know that we actually had a firsthand in that of really saving these people's lives. Exactly. We did two days of search and recovery and then the third day turned into security for the forestry. Once again, trees everywhere, you can't move. Lockdown, streets are locked down completely. No communications, no electric, no water, no nothing. So that mission was very strong in itself because and I'm saying security just to keep the vehicles away while they're working. That way nobody gets hurt and there is no issues. So that was kind of the security for the forestry. Was there was there an issue with like communication back to us like here in Pasco? Absolutely, yes, there was no communication. We used satellite phones that communicate back this way because the local service was not available. So how many, I know it took a while before you guys actually like got to doing the PD sort of like law enforcement side of things. How long did it take after you guys first deployed to get to that point? I believe on the fourth day, probably the fourth day we started to do law enforcement functions riding with the locals. We would pair up with them and also have our deputies ride by themselves. We use their radio communication to keep in contact and this had twofold, not only helping them out with what was going on but also giving them that sense of relief to if they had to go take care of their own issues, they were able to do it by us being there. Now remember these law enforcement, these first responders lost everything just like everybody else did. So you could imagine now helping out the community doing their job and they have nothing to return home to. So once again a very good feeling of knowing what we did for them to give them that sense of relief and that ability for them to actually recoup mentally and only physically. How does Hurricane Michael differ from any sort of hurricanes that we've had here like Irma for a slash or what's the difference that you guys have seen? I'd say the total the more destruction the trees down just for instance over here in Irma we experienced quite a few trees down on the east side of the county around Zephyr Hills but like you said earlier all all over Lindhaven was just destruction. Trees, trees blocking the road where when we were doing our search and rescue we were actually bobbing and weaving through the trees and climbing over we had to bring chainsaws in case we had to cut our paths away. I've worked several hurricanes I've been here a long time. Andrew in the 90s Irma and now this I can tell you one thing like like Sergeant Medina says here this one had a complete different feel to it as far as the destruction not so much the water damage that you usually see with the hurricanes it was the destruction of the land itself of the environment and once again that going into place it makes it that much harder to to recover from it because your first act is number one of course search and recovery then you have to now fix what's down from power lines to trees everywhere. I will say for the amount of damage that occurred in this one their spirits locally very high they were able to establish oh yes very very high they that community and law enforcement community couldn't thank us enough I think Sergeant Jirkin Convalje was a constant thank you thank you thank you and we were like no no thank you needed I mean we're for God's sake look what you've been through so very strong strong sense of community in that area and they they were able to establish rapidly very good points of distribution which with everything going on it was amazing to see with the lack of communication with the lack of everything that there was actually points of distribution that were established and very rapidly and were able to be sent out to the people so I mean from one day to the next you started seeing these distribution points for for goods water food necessities and they were established quick and it was put out quick that's awesome so that's also the semi that we sent up as well that was also part of that that's that's really good to hear though so what's the from here so we're like like a week and a half out from when Hurricane Michael first initially hit so what are the steps that were taken from here going forward and in regards to us helping well we've been in contact with the group that's up there now they're doing major mainly road patrol functions now so once again giving those locals that opportunity to be home be off take care of their own personal issues they're keeping a very small element of the locals on while we pretty much take over all law enforcement functions okay working shift working things of that nature and I believe we'll probably have to go to Alpha Bravo we'll be covering days and nights while we're there deployed okay so for those of our for our viewers that don't know what Alpha Bravo means just in simple terms what is it basically a quick 12 hour shift okay you'll have evenings and days depending how you split it around the clock 24 hour coverage five to five six to six whatever that decision is made but it's an Alpha Bravo Alpha being day Bravo being nighttime I just want to say that once again was a heck of an experience um and to know how how the community all came together and law enforcement and first responders um it tells you that no matter what's going on there's always good in the world and you really see any situations that includes like the community down here in Pasca with all those goods going up there the trucks have been non-stop up there those guys been really kicking butt and bringing in those supplies just want to say thank you to all of our men and women all of the men and women across the counties that have gone up to help everyone that has been affected in the panhandle um do not forget to stay tuned into all of our social media platforms if you're local if you would like to continue to donate um we do still have stations that are set up for that so continue to like comment and subscribe and we'll see you next time