Exclusive: At The Center of Tragedy — Asheville, North Carolina

14 Days at Mission Hospital

by Fred Hernandez
The Sentinel had a source on the ground in Asheville, North Carolina reporting on real time conditions in one of the most devastated areas resulting from the recent hurricane. Based on the follow-up interview of the Florida based team members, this is the Sentinel report:

After receiving an urgent call for help from their central emergency office, the Disaster Response Systems team, (DRS) took a commercial flight to Greenville, North Carolina, from Florida. At the airport they were taken on the next phase of the trek in a four-wheel drive Jeep Wrangler over very rough terrain and roads that had been almost washed out by heavy flooding to a rally point where they hopped on an EC-135, a large helicopter that also serves as aerial ambulances.
On their flight inbound they could see the extent of the destruction and the totally unexpected level of damage wrought on Ashville and the surrounding areas by the monster hurricane, Helene. The EC-135 landed on the rooftop of the Mission Hospital in Asheville. The seven hundred bed facility was surrounded by water and the emergency room on the ground floor was totally inundated.
Once on the ground the devastation was even more glaring. Pine trees bore evidence of how high the water rose from the clothing and other detritus and dregs tangled in the branches twenty or more feet above the ground. In one instance a human body was spotted high up in the trees tangled in the branches. Cars and other vehicles, sunk deeply in thick mud, had tags placed by workers in hazmat suits. The tags strictly instructed passersby and others not to open the doors or try to remove the vehicles. It quickly became clear that these vehicles were the final resting places of some of the unfortunate victims of destruction and death delivered by Helene’s
heavy hand.
After locating some higher ground close as possible to the medical facility that had been spared from flooding, they set up their emergency rooms in tents and immediately began the much
needed aid and care of waiting patients, many of whom had received no medical attention in days.

Mission Hospital in Asheville, part of a chain of medical facilities, the only hospital for thirteen counties in the area, is owned and operated by Hospital Corporation of America, (HCA), one of the largest healthcare companies in the country. Mission is a Level Two Trauma Center. The members of the emergency response team from other states came to Asheville to assist their colleagues in this time of disaster. They were to relieve the hospital workers of their duties in order to give them the time and opportunity to attend to their own family’s needs.
But this was not to be. After leaving the hospital they were the ones who were giving desperately needed aid to other victims in the rural areas. Helping people out of their mud filled and destroyed homes, giving aid to those rendered homeless and ferrying those in need back to the emergency rooms set up in tents outside the flooded medical building. There was no evidence of any teams or helpers from the government. These teams are known in their trade as strike teams. Team members who had previous experiences in these types of national disasters said that usually the government had teams of search and rescue professionals and medical aid personnel. This time there were none of these teams.

There were FEMA personnel on the outskirts of the town proper, but they were simply preventing outsiders from coming into the affected disaster zones. They were also “confiscating” whatever relief goods were being brought in. The real assistance came from surrounding states and mainly from private groups and enterprises. In fact, they were surprised that only fifty miles from Asheville, there is a military installation that had several large helicopters that would have been ideal for rescuing people from their rural homes and ferrying them to safety. It was common knowledge on the ground that while the personnel at the base were eager to help, they were not allowed to do so.

This was a double disaster for some of the communities affected by this natural calamity. The first disaster caused by nature is something that man cannot control. Nature will behave as it is supposed to. After a natural disaster, however, man, which is to say government, should have been able to control the aftermath at least a little bit better than it was in this case.

To have had no funds available to assist its citizens because they had squandered their budgets on illegal aliens entering the country in such a force, much like the hurricane, is inexcusable and unconscionable.
For fourteen days, the team worked sixteen-hour days continuously, before they were told that they could return to their homes. And so as they prepared to leave their posts they sadly took a last look around. Their surroundings seemed as if it had been ravaged by a marauding army. Death and destruction everywhere. Their last memory was the stench permeating the air while above them flocks of buzzards circled lazily over the treetops.

Fred Hernandez comments:
In this reporter’s opinion, nature’s hurricane causing much destruction and death on American communities is akin to the man-made destruction caused by those in office to allow millions of unvetted, illegal aliens to swarm into the country unchecked. Much like an unwelcome hurricane. In some cases the same government officials intentionally flew in illegal aliens from other countries and settled them in small communities disrupting the lives of law-abiding citizens, causing cumbersome difficulties on their modest resources and inflicting pain and in some cases even death. Nature cannot be held accountable for its behavior. However, in the case of men inflicting great damage on his fellowman, they should be taken to task.