Home sweet home!
A group of Los Angeles County employees got the much-deserved rest Tuesday morning after returning home from a grueling, two-week deployment to Turkey.
The local members of the USAID team provided support for communities that are devastated by the 7.8 magnitude earthquake that rocked southeastern Turkey and Syria earlier this month.
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Along with search-and-rescue workers from the LA County Fire Department, engineers from the Public Works department were also some of the first aid workers to arrive in the hardest hit areas of Turkey.
“It was a big one to see so many people go through such a catastrophic event,” One firefighter described. “I want to be able to hug them and tell them it’s going to be okay, but we know they’re not going to be okay for a long time.”
The engineers were able to lend their expertise in building safety. The structural specialists conducted “a wide range of structural and safety assessments” so that buildings like homes, hospitals and schools are safe to occupy, according to a statement from LA County Public Works.
”In some cases, this meant meeting with devastated family members to tell them whether they could safely return to their homes,” the department explained. “In others, it was determining whether a structure was safe enough for search and rescue teams to engage in life-saving operations and recommending mitigation measures to minimize the risk to task force members and the survivors who were trapped under tons of rubble and debris.”
When the team of LA County workers landed at LAX Monday night, Sinan Kuzum, the Turkish general Consul to Los Angeles attended the homecoming ceremony in Pacoima to express his gratitude.
“I knew they were one of the first teams to be there to help my people,” Kuzum said. “I was super amazed at what they were doing to help my people.”
