Experienced Princeton volunteer search-rescue group deploys disaster teams to South
Published: September 9, 2005
A search and rescue foundation with its roots in Princeton has mobilized some 200 volunteers to aid recovery efforts from Hurricane Katrina in Louisiana.
The Bear Search and Rescue Foundation, whose president, Scott Shields, is a Princeton resident, has deployed 22 teams of volunteers from throughout the country to help in the recovery — efforts that, according to Louisiana officials, will be weighty. The burden of suffering from the storm promises to rest heavily on New Orleans, where the levee system on which the city depends failed.
The foundation, which was formed in 2002 with a goal to provide search-and-rescue teams from across the country with instruction in emergency management, as well as equipment, is shifting its mission to pure action.
“Right now, (the volunteers) are getting people out of the water,” said Patty Shields, also of Princeton, and sister of Mr. Shields, former director of marine safety for the New York City Urban Parks Search and Rescue Team, who is in Louisiana and could not be contacted.
Ms. Shields, who is manning the phones in an effort to help organize the effort, said her brother received a letter from Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco asking the organization to send volunteers for search and rescue.
Only with permission from authorities are volunteers permitted to mobilize and travel to the Gulf Coast to assist, Ms. Shields explained.
Experienced teams from across the country associated with The Bear Search and Rescue Foundation — from as far as California and Wisconsin — headed to Louisiana with copies of Gov. Blanco’s letter, provided by Mr. Shields. The governor, said Ms. Shields, “trusted Capt. Shields to pick people who knew what they were doing.”
But because the foundation has pledged it would purchase gas for each of the teams from across the country, money is growing tight, Ms. Shields said. “We really have to raise some money fast because gas money is rolling out,” she said.
Ms. Shields said she is unsure how long the teams will remain in Louisiana.
The Bear Search and Rescue Foundation was established with the help of the law firm Proskauer Rose LLP and has a history associated with another one of America’s devastating tragedies — the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
On that day, Mr. Shields and his 11-year-old golden retriever, Bear, traveled to Ground Zero from Greenwich, Conn., to help in the rescue efforts at the World Trade Center. Working 18-hour days, Bear was one of the first canines to search the rubble and he is credited with finding many victims, including the beloved chief of the New York City Fire Department, Peter Ganci, according to the foundation’s Web site.
Bear has since died of cancer and the foundation was named in his honor.
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