ODESSA, Texas — On Monday, more than 50 residents were trying to find their new normal after a fire blazed through Fairgreen Apartment Homes in Odessa.
25 families have since had to pack all of their belongings and relocate for shelter, but efforts to help them are far from over.
"We respond to fires, home fires, all the way to apartment fires," said Red Cross Permian Basin Chapter Disaster Action Team Coordinator Shane Bell. "We're meeting people for the first time on the worst day of their of their lives, so we're there to give them that ray of hope."
On Saturday night, nearly 50 residents had to evacuate building six at the complex. Staircases are boarded up, glass is scattered across the entire building from busted windows and the roof is barely standing. Luckily, American Red Cross has been helping them get what they need ever since.
"We had a shelter open for the first couple of nights for those that needed a place to stay, and then we've transitioned them into the next point of that process," Bell said.
That process being getting families through the next 48 hours.
"Some people may have a place to stay, but they need to buy food and clothes," Shane Bell. "They may have the children that may have specific needs that they need to get, and then the other thing we do is work with them. If they have any health-related issues such as they lost a breathing machine or they lost their glasses, you know, little things like that that you don't think of until everything kind of calms down."
The role of Red Cross during times like these is not only immediate assistance, but helping victims find their new normal as well.
"A lot of people don't think about is what would I do if my home was destroyed in a fire, what do I need," Bell added. "A lot of the thing we do is through that recovery process is ask those triggering questions about did you lose your ID? Oh, you did. OK, so here's how to get that replaced and going through that process."
While Red Cross helps with monetary relief, they look to the community to fill in other gaps of need like clothing.
"For this one, we've been sending people that want to donate clothes to say, Catholic Charities and letting our clients know go to Catholic Charities if you need clothes and things like that," Bell said. "It really depends on the need and every individual has a different kind of disaster need."
When disasters like these happen, the Red Cross is always in need of volunteers. The Permian Basin Chapter of American Red Cross serves 19 counties and the goal is to have volunteers in every county so that when something as unfortunate as this apartment fire happens again, neighbors can help one another.
NewsWest 9 did reach out to Weidner Apartment Homes, the management company for Fairgreen Apartment Homes, but we have not received a comment from them at this time.