HEALING MEXICO'S WOUNDS

Member of the San Francisco 49ers
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SALVATION ARMY DISASTER RELIEF TEAM

By the time we reach Mexico City, it is dark. As the plane flies inlow over the capital, there is no hint of the destruction that is supposed to be below. The lights and traffic appear to be normal. Life does not seem to have been drastically altered as it seemed in the pictures we saw before leaving home.

It wasn't even twenty-four hours earlier that the phone rang. It was the Salvation Army. They asked about my experience as a U.S. Army field medic sixteen years ago. I was asked about whether I could deal with mass casualties, trauma, and sanitation problems. I responded with only one word, "Yes." The caller then asked if I could be at San Francisco International at dawn the next morning. I answered with the same word again.

Now, I'm on this jet with forty-eight others who got a similar call. It's a strange potpourri of people: ten doctors, about a dozen nurses, the same number of people who - like me - are former military medics, several medical and nursing students, a few firemen, a couple social workers, one guy who repairs medical equipment, and several structural engineers and architects who are supposed to be experts at designing earthquake proof buildings and dismantling buildings that fail to stand the test of such calamities.

The plane carrying the volunteers and load of medical supplies finally touches down, but takes an eternity to roll to a stop. We strain to look out the windows but can't see a thing. The plane is bathed in a flood of high powered lights. We are kept on the plane for an hour. A rumor starts to circulate that the Mexican government wants us to go home. The hatch opens and we step out onto a rickety stairway. It's a spooky scene similar to the one in "CLOSE ENCOUNTERS" when the door of the alien ship opens.

As our eyes adjust to the lights, we see the plane is circled by a small army of short Mexican G-I's. Each is dressed as though ready for war. Each carries a rifle - almost as long as the tallest soldier in the ranks. We are nudged to move along quickly into one of the remote terminal buildings. We are ushered past two lines of television cameras, as microphones poke at us. Fears that we are not welcome quickly fade as hands reach out to ours and many people break through the lines to embrace us.

We are met in the terminal by the Mexican chief of the Salvation Army. He tells us we are needed badly at the Benito Juarez hospital. The big aftershock the night before caused a wing of the hospital to collapse. When it hit, the fifty doctors who had survived the first temblor were meeting in that part of the building to discuss how to deal with the mass casualties. There is little hope any survived, leaving one of the city's busiest hospitals with virtually no doctors.

We board a bus, and make our way through heavy traffic heading for an area of Mexico City said to have been hardest hit. As the traffic thins, the destruction becomes worse as we move closer to the center of the catastrophe. The scene is as though some gigantic monster related to Godzilla had stormed through the area.

Gradually, we begin to detect the sweetly pungent odor. Down deep, I know what it is but try to believe it is anything else. A hush falls over the group of volunteers as more of us on the bus notice the sickening smell. The driver erases any doubts when he whispers that the smell of rotting cadavers is growing worse. Several on the bus start to gag and one by one we slip surgical masks over our faces. I look around and realize we now look no different than the throng of masked people wandering aimlessly along the street.

We arrive at the hospital where it is strangely quiet and dark. In the distance I hear the muffled sound of digging with an occasional shout in Spanish which I don't understand. I work my way through the crowd of somber people to a garage door that is guarded by a pair of heavily armed soldiers. I instinctively dig in my pocket for my press credentials issued by the Secret Service. The soldiers spot the bold U.S. Eagle and push the doors open to let me inside. It is a scene I will never forget. The outside of the building doesn't look damaged at all, but the inside is GONE!

Hundreds of people are frantically clawing at the debris on top of agigantic pile of rubble. There is no way to prepare for this scene. I hear a voice cry out in English, "Body bags. Body bags over here!" I follow the voice through the dusty haze and find an American doctor who had been in Mexico on vacation. He struggles to pull a lifeless form from the dirt. I want to help but am paralyzed.

After a while, those in charge of our group realizes there is little for us to do here. We climb back on the bus for a long drive through other areas of destruction, and ultimately find ourselves in a district which seems to have escaped any effect of the earthquakes.

We pull up in front of an elegant high rise hotel, The Presidente. Most of the volunteers join a unanimous protest. Some fear staying in a forty-two story building in a still trembling city. Others object to the apparent waste of housing us in what seems to be exorbitant luxury. The fight does not last long. We are all too tired and emotionally drained to have the energy to find an alternative, so we quietly go to the rooms provided for us.

At dawn we go across town to a poor neighborhood on the northeast side. We arrive at the Salvation Army building in Colonia Morelos on Imprinta. In less than three hours we transform a chapel, which appears to have been a warehouse at one time, into a fully functional medical clinic. Even before we officially open, a line of patients forms outside and extends around the block.

A few are actually earthquake victims with various cuts, bruises, and other injuries. Most are just poor people with colds, diarrhea, and the like. Many are suffering from what the doctors label post trauma anxiety. All they really need is somebody to show them a little care and tenderness, although a few do leave with tranquilizers. Few of them have ever seen a doctor before in their lives. One of those is a young woman who is twenty-five but looks forty years old. She has four kids and is expecting a fifth. I am amazed that any of these people have survived beyond childhood, even without an earthquake.

About two in the afternoon, we break for lunch. It is a meal we'll grow to know well. It is basically two things: Rice and Beans. I've hated rice since I was in the army. After three meals a day for seven days featuring frijoles, I can now add beans to my list of dislikes. We share our rations with some of the people coming into the clinic. They seem so grateful for a share of this putty-like goo. I wonder how they would react to pizza.

One thing is definitely missing: Water. We have been warned about what we drink. To avoid the worry, I accept being thirsty until the second or third day when a case of Coke arrives like a gift from heaven. At the same time, the ghetto people pull their water supply from the manholes on the corner. An endless line of people dip plastic buckets under the street to retrieve the liquid necessary for life, but a liquid that is sure to be so contaminated it threatens health. It is a strange dichotomy.

I find one little boy hiding behind a church pew which has been turned into an examination table. A Spanish speaking woman on our team acts as an interpreter for me. I discover his name is Hector and he wants to know if there is a job for him in the clinic.

We evidently helped his mother earlier in the day, and he wants to repay us. I tell Hector to go door-to-door (or tent-to-tent as the case may be) and look for other kids who might need medical attention. Barely an hour later he returns with half a dozen youngsters. All of them are sick or injured. Hector continued this job all week. I am amazed that all the kids he brings in really do need help. Hector's barely seven years old, and he knows what triage is all about!

We work into the late evening, not knowing exactly how to tell those still in line to return in the morning. We quickly go through the crowd and check to see if there are any people who need immediate care. There are a few. We bring them inside for treatment as the others fade into the shadows of the street.

Monday morning we split up into several groups. We spend about half the day in the clinic, and the other half with the engineers who are trying to help Mexican officials find survivors in the rubble. Some of us work in hospitals where there are staff shortages because of injuries or fatigue. Others of us set up street corner aid stations in other parts of the barrio.

We see some amazing things at those places. We find the remnants of a family living in an old car. While changing a bandage on the foot of a woman who was hurt when her house collapsed, killing two of her children, I see a baby on the front seat behind the woman who appears to have been given a bath in methiolate. I run around to the other side of the car and nearly start to cry as I see a child who has obviously gone through hell. She has cuts and bruises all over her little body, with one bandage across the top of her head. The doctor with us removes the tape, revealing a tidy but hurriedly done suture job. A note pinned to the tiny girl's blouse was two pages of instructions, explaining the girl had a skull fracture and what should be done for follow-up treatment. Unfortunately, the doctor who first treated the little girl was too busy to find out the mother could not read.

Later at a street corner aid station I decide fatigue has finally gotten to me as I try to take the blood pressure of a man about my age. After several attempts I keep getting a reading of 160 over nothing. The crusty old doctor with us who has seen just about everything does not show a hint of surprise. He raises the man's shirt to reveal a long surgical scar down the middle of his chest. I am baffled how anyone living in this poor neighborhood could afford a heart valve operation. But here is a man who has had one of those expensive surgeries, and he is overdue for another. We all wonder what his fate will be.

Days later someone tells me a body was found in an alley near the clinic. The description of the body matches my memory of the tired looking man with a big scar and a crazy blood pressure.

Death chooses many ways to come calling in this devastated city. While many thousands are killed by the mighty force of the trembling earth when it rips apart buildings - crushing the life out of people, many perish in more subtle and quiet ways.

As we live with the constant threat that an aftershock might kill us with rumbling violence, we face the very real possibility we may succumb to a silent killer, such as disease. In the course of our mission more than three-fourths of our team would fall victim for a day or two to some form of Montezuma's revenge.

Some of us are sent to one of many demolished hospitals to assist rescue efforts. This time it is at what had been a cancer treatment center. Word later reaches us that a flask of radioactive cobalt may have been ruptured there. There is fear that all of the people who have been there are now contaminated with deadly chemicals.

We all do some heavy duty praying for our comrades as they head for the U.S. Embassy to be tested. Fortunately, none show any sign of having made contact with the dangerous radiation.

Days later, though, panic strikes again when we hear an Algerian demolition crew had been sent to the same therapy center - to blow up what was left of the hospital. American diplomats intervene in time to prevent the explosion which surely would have spread another deadly specter over this already grieving city.

One night a group of our team finds itself paired with several Mexican doctors in an area that must have been a garment district before the earthquakes. We set up shop between two building which had collapsed during the second major temblor Friday night. One appears to have been a high rise apartment building, with eleven floors now crunched into about half that. The other was probably a ten story factory or warehouse. The back half of that building lay in a pile of broken concrete and bricks, with rescue workers crawling on top of the massive heap.

The omnipresent smell of death is so bad here, even the surgical masks do little to prevent the nausea from taking over our bodies. I dash toward an alley. Suddenly a soldier with a machine-gun steps in front of me, preventing me from reaching the dark area behind the building. I try to use sign language to let the soldier know I am getting sick. He shrugs his shoulders and points to the ground beside his shiny boots. I comply with his directions.

Meanwhile, the search continues for anyone who may still be alive in either of the damaged buildings. Boys, little boys between ten and fifteen years old climb ropes on the outside of what is left of the structures. They find a hole and crawl inside in a dangerous, usually futile, attempt to find any sign of life. After an eternity, one of the "moles" emerges from the rubble with a wave. A shout would be appropriate but such an outburst of joy might cause a vibration serious enough to cause the fragile pile to collapse again. Inside an area which can not be reached, the boys hear two separate noises - giving hope that two people are still alive. One sound comes from a debris packed stairwell, the other from an inaccessible bathroom.

The rest of the night is spent trying to find a way to rescue the survivors - at least two who are trapped inside. A way is not found. A high ranking official decides such a rescue attempt to save two people is not worth the risk to the number of lives necessary to make the effort. At dawn a demolition crew flattens the building.

Moments like that are frustrating. Others give a deep sense of satisfaction. Most of the kids coming into the clinic are not just sick. They are also scared about being poked, prodded, and examined by the light skinned people who do not speak their language. There is never enough time to explain the shot of penicillin you pump into the tiny rear ends. You just do it and move on to the next. We don't have suckers to pass out, but we do have an over-supply of rubber gloves. I find blowing them up like balloons and drawing faces on the inflated hands turns the screams and tears into reluctant smiles.

My last evening in Mexico City was a rough one. Before my final departure from the clinic, Hector shows up with a bunch of his little friends. He must be reading something in my eyes as he asks, "Avignon San Francisco manyana?" No words can come out of my mouth. I start to nod, but break down crying harder than I have in years. My little amigoes jump up and grab me around the neck and legs. I don't need a translator to figure out their screams mean, "Don't go!" But I know it is time to do just that.

A replacement team of Salvation Army volunteers from Oregon has taken over operation of the clinic, so several of us head to a hotel to wash up and get some rest before the flight home. In the lobby I run into a Mexican doctor I met earlier in the week. He says he just came from the Benito Juarez Hospital where there had been a big demonstration. People with family members still trapped inside tried to stop army engineers from demolishing a wing of the facility where a French rescue team detected signs of life the night before. The commander ordered his troops in, and the protesters out. The wrecking ball slammed into the building again and again. Huge slabs of concrete tumbled down revealing about eighty dead babies. The doctor says he felt a couple of the tiny bodies and they were still warm, indicating they were not killed by the earthquake - but at the hands of the wrecking crew.

At dinner I suddenly get a queasy feeling. A nurse at the table points to four or five chandeliers swinging back and forth in unison. Another earthquake! I close my eyes and say a prayer.

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Back in the States a Salvation Army official told me that aftershock killed fourteen people, one of them a youngster named Diego. He was one of the "moles" we met at the damaged jeans factory. When the Friday temblor struck, Diego was digging his way through another badly damaged building looking for any remote sign of life.

While Diego is gone, he has achieved a sort of immortality in our memories - especially in the mind of Louisa, one of the nurses on our team. She had wanted to adopt the young "mole," and bring him bring back to California.

For me, it is the memory of Hector that remains vivid. I'll never forget a myriad of images of Hector and his little friends who were unable to comprehend or understand the magnitude and impact of the tragedy which surrounded them - the worst natural calamity of the century to ravage this hemisphere. The huge brown eyes of the children who nearly made it impossible for us to leave remains like a melancholy painting in my mind.

But our mission did end and we came home; home to a place where we never again will take fresh running water, electricty, and unspoiled air for granted. None of the forty-nine volunteers will ever be the same after having had our lives touched by the Mexican people, people who continue to experience horrendous suffering in an atmosphere reeking of death.

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I also came home to a full tape on my answering machine. On it were calls from people all around the country with whom I hadn't talked in years. All of them had apparently seen me on television during an interview with Martha Teichner. I vaguely remember running into her outside the clinic one day when I was totally worn to a frazzle. I thought it was just a chat between two people who knew each other professionally. For all my years in the business, I can't imagine how I didn't notice the rest of her field crew. I didn't even know I had been on television - until my answering machine messages said so. The calls were all a pleasant surprise.

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One message was from an old friend who was Senator Quayle's press secretary - before Dan got the VP job. He invited me to visit him back in Indiana. Click the LOGO to find out what happened when I did.

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