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Red Cross Gives International Help To 9/11 Victims, Families
Written by
Lesly Hallman
, Staff Writer and Photographer, RedCross.org
Wednesday, May 12, 2004 — More than two and a half years after the loss of his sister Yvonne in the attacks of 9/11, Barrie O’Prey of Australia visited the United States this March to help heal the wounds her unexpected death caused. And his trip was a benefit he would not have received without the hard work of the International Family Assistance Program (IFAP) of the American Red Cross.
Earlier this year, Barrie contacted the Australian Red Cross to see if there was anyway for him and his wife to visit the U.S. and see the places his sister saw last. Yvonne was a passenger on American Airlines 77 that went into the Pentagon on 9/11. After learning of his sister’s death, Barrie spent months glued to the television, transfixed by the devastating images of the tragedy, and unable to fathom why his sister was gone.
From the beginning, the Red Cross recognized that there would be a huge international component to dealing with the victims of 9/11 because so many of those killed were from other countries.
Barrie and Janice O’Prey of Australia visited the United States thanks to the International Family Assistance Program. |
“We realized quickly that one of the first and most important things would be travel assistance, so that was the first program created,” said International Family Assistance Program (IFAP) manager Daniel Zellman.
As a result families around the world were able to come to the U.S. when they may not have been able to on their own. As families made arrangements to travel to New York, the American Red Cross initially announced that it would provide three family members with one week of travel and expenses. A few months later, the program expanded to cover up to six family members for two weeks, along with covering mental health counseling and providing an emergency financial gift.
The program also provided travel assistance for families to attend the first anniversary services of the attacks at Ground Zero.
Visit to the Pentagon Gives Relief
Barrie’s sister Yvonne was vacationing in the United States and Canada after retiring from 25 years of service with the Australian Red Cross when she died. She started as a disaster volunteer, and spent the last ten years of her life as State Coordinator for the Voluntary Aid Service Corp (VASC) in New South Wales.
“There are 20 million Australians and 250 million Americans in the world, and my sister is on one of those planes,” said Barrie. “It’s something I still can’t reconcile.”
Barrie’s sister Yvonne Kennedy left two sons behind when she died in the plane crash at the Pentagon on Sept. 11. |
“I know it’s a cliché, but coming here has been such a weight off my shoulders,” said Barrie. “I really felt an emotional release, especially when we visited the Pentagon,” where Yvonne died. “I know it was a cliché, but to be there really took a weight off my shoulders.”
“We never even thought about it at first, and when we got the call that we could come we just couldn’t believe it,” said Janice, Barrie’s wife. “It was the last thing we expected.”
IFAP works with two sets of clients: those living overseas who are relatives of someone killed, injured or otherwise affected by the attacks; and those living in the U.S. with international concerns, such as an injured New Yorker who supports family members overseas.
All told, the American Red Cross worked with 65 Red Cross and Red Crescent societies around the world, providing close to $9 million in financial assistance to nearly 500 international clients. While all the societies subscribe to the same charter of the International Committee of the Red Cross, each represents the culture of its home, and the differences are sometimes huge.
“Given everything, it’s really amazing how well it all worked domestically and internationally,” said Zellman. “What we were dealing with quite often were National Societies with vastly different bureaucratic structures, not to mention different languages. Basically, the challenge is coordination. It’s one thing to work with someone in Kansas, its something totally different to work with someone in rural India.”
For example, some of the standard methods for processing paperwork, like sending a fax or a package, were much more difficult in some countries than they are in the United States. Respecting and overcoming local customs and procedures was an important issue that the office sometimes struggled to handle.
At this point, most remaining overseas clients are receiving mental health assistance and have been transitioned to receive support through local providers. But even arranging that transition has been a challenge in some cases, because many countries have approaches to mental health that are quite different from those in the U.S.
“In Mexico, for example, it was difficult for us to find private doctors, so we modified the program to give funds to the Mexican Red Cross, who then hired its own doctor to provide treatment,” said Zellman. “We tried to do things like that as much as possible.”
Assistance from IFAP also took many other forms, from direct cash assistance, to help with the repatriation of loved ones’ remains and funeral or memorial services.
“While no amount of money can heal the wounds of 9/11,” Zellman said, “we hope the assistance we’ve provided has eased the burden and made life at least a little less difficult than it would have been without our help.”
This article is third in a series about the September 11 Recovery Program of the Red Cross.
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