The American Red Cross is gearing up to send volunteers from the Coastal Bend to help Florida in the wake of Hurricane Matthew.
Fernando Fernandez, Sr., has been volunteering with the Red Cross for about eight years, and Milton Bradford has been volunteering for some eleven years.
Both men just returned from helping victims of flooding from Hurricane Hermine in the Florida panhandle. That storm struck at the beginning of September. Before that, they were helping victims of flooding in Louisiana.
Now, both men said they are on standby to go help on the East Coast as soon as they get the call.
"I've been through hurricanes. I've been through floods. I've been through tornadoes," Fernandez said. "As a matter of fact, I was in Louisiana before, I was home a week, and then I went to Florida."
"I've been involved with shelter. That's when clients, when they seek shelter -- that could be involving setting up cots, feeding people," Bradford said. "Bulk distribution, that's actually handing out supplies such as bleach, a mop, a broom, food."
There is no indication yet when the men might get the call. It could be tonight or tomorrow, and it could be Florida or even Georgia or the Carolinas.