“I know without a shadow of a doubt that I’m supposed to work for the [American] Red Cross.”
This belief is what drove Ciara West on an 8-year Red Cross journey that took her across the country and through multiple volunteer positions.
While her family is from the West Coast, Ciara has lived in Bowling Green, KY for the last 20 years. In her spare time, she enjoys visiting flea markets and breathing new life into the treasures she finds as art or by refurbishing them.
Her introduction to the Red Cross started with the Joplin, Missouri tornado in 2011.
“The severity of it pulled at my heart strings,” said Ciara. She and her sister couldn’t stop themselves from doing something. They drove to Joplin to just do laundry, but when they got there Ciara looked around and saw Red Cross volunteers helping in the aftermath.
When Ciara got home, she reached out to her local Red Cross chapter and signed up to deploy as a disaster volunteer to Joplin.
“I remember looking around at the shock and sadness,” said Ciara, “I watched people’s emotions and realized that the Red Cross does so much. Emotionally, physically, financially. We get to touch all of that. It is the most satisfying, close to heart feeling.”
Over the years, Ciara would go on to respond to disasters big and small as a disaster services volunteer. She responded to home fires in her community and deployed to disasters in other states, including deploying for 8 weeks to assist after Hurricane Isaac, and deploying to West Virginia after a chemical spill. “It’s so humbling. Every day I go home and I’m grateful. Every day I work with the Red Cross, it keeps me a humble, passionate human. It keeps me grounded that my life, belongings, I have it [now], but tomorrow it could be gone. But I could turn to Red Cross and they would help.
Ciara spent time as in an Americorps with the Red Cross, and then went on to take classes with FEMA. She spent time away from the Red Cross earning her Master’s Degree for Organizational leadership at Western Kentucky University. She went into manufacturing as a training coordinator and worked in workforce development for a time, but it didn’t spark her passion the way her Red Cross work had.
“My kids said ‘I have never been more happy than when you were doing your Red Cross thing’,” said Ciara. “I came back to the chapter and said “I’m willing to give you my life. I dove into it.”
One of the most eye-opening experiences for Ciara came in 2021 when she deployed to help respond to the 2021 December tornados that touched down in parts of Kentucky, including Bowling Green.
“When I got to [the tornado] disaster response, I was crying because of the amount of damage, the people it affected, the homes I lived in personally that were wiped off the map. This was my home town. It was almost too much to absorb. When it’s your home town, it was so personal and so shocking.”
Ciara was deployed for the entire tornado response. On the first night, she helped open a shelter in Bowling Green. As the response progressed and the needs of the community changed, she transitioned from sheltering and helping with feeding to disaster assessment and assisting with casework for impacted families. Her family and friends supported her through the deployment.
“I didn’t question it, I just found a way,” said Ciara. “Being on a disaster response from day one to the last day, it was the most eye opening of my life. It teaches you how it affects people from start to finish.”
One of the things that stood out to her the most about this deployment were the stories of resilience she encountered from her community.
“The people I got to meet that would sit across the desk and thank me when they have nothing to go home to—I was in awe of these people. I started asking people how they were so resilient.”
Ciara described one gentlemen who had lost his home and was trapped in the debris. “He had no home to go back to, but his neighbors dug him out and got his dog, and now he doesn’t know how he could ever move away from that neighborhood or those neighbors!
“I worked with another family in Warren County who lost their home to the tornado, a family of seven. We got them into a new home, and then their apartment complex burned down!” Ciara went on to share that the Red Cross was able to find the family another safe place to stay after the fire.
“It’s made me so much closer to all of the people in this town,” said Ciara. “Adversity and disaster makes a community rally. It gives me all the faith in humanity that one needs.”
When asked what keeps drawing her to working with the Red Cross, Ciara explained it was the power of helping people and the ability to use the skills she has learned to make a difference during some of the worst moments in people’s lives.
We are excited to share that, as of this blog post, Ciara has become the disaster program specialist for the Red Cross South Central Kentucky Chapter! Ciara—we are grateful to have dedicated, caring Red Crossers like you helping fulfill the Red Cross mission and providing comfort and hope to people in times of crisis. Thank you for being a volunteer and congratulations on your new role!
Learn more about volunteering with the Red Cross by visiting redcross.org/volunteer.
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