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<p>WILKES-BARRE &#8212; Jim and Kate Crowley, the Tunkhannock couple who forfeited their vacation to volunteer in the flood relief recovery effort in Texas, have returned home &#8220;pretty tired.&#8221;</p><p>That&#8217;s what Kate Crowley said Wednesday when she talked about her experience of delivering meals to victims of Hurricane Harvey.</p><p>The Crowleys were all set to leave for a vacation to Canada, but they had been watching the news and decided to cancel their planned trip, saying they wanted to help all the people in Texas and Louisiana that were affected by the hurricane.</p><p>The Crowleys drove a Red Cross emergency response vehicle (ERV) from Wilkes-Barre to Texas and they spent two weeks volunteering at a kitchen that helped to feed flood victims in Dickinson, Texas.</p><p>&#8220;It was quite an interesting assignment for us,&#8221; Kate said. &#8220;We never did one like that before. It was very demanding physically. We came home pretty tired.&#8221;</p><p>The Crowleys departed Aug. 28 and returned home Sept. 11. It took them several days to drive to Texas, first stopping in Louisiana before being assigned to Houston, and eventually, the hard-hit town of Dickinson.</p><p>Kate said she and Jim encountered several closed roads and detours along the way before getting to Baton Rouge for their assignment.</p><p>They were directed to Houston and traveled in a convoy with ERVs from across the country.</p><p>Kate said she and Jim were assigned to work a kitchen in Dickinson that was set up by volunteers from the Southern Baptist Church. It was there that they found themselves under the supervision of Barry Abromovage of Bristol, Virginia, who grew up in Wyoming Borough and graduated from Wyoming Area High School.</p><p>&#8220;Barry was the kitchen supervisor,&#8221; Kate said. &#8220;We discovered we were from the same area and we talked about Luzerne County and he knew Tunkhannock very well. We had a long chat. Usually when we go to these events, nobody has ever heard of Tunkhannock. Barry was a good guy and he asked us to say hello to his family members who still live in the area.&#8221;</p><p>Kate said the kitchen they worked out of was set up in a parking lot of a Baptist church. She said everything was outside under several tents with all the equipment needed to prepare meals and clean.</p><p>&#8220;It was very elaborate,&#8221; Kate said. &#8220;There were 15 other volunteer teams there. Twice a day we took prepared meals and delivered them to people in the town of Dickinson. It was a pretty hard-hit residential area.&#8221;</p><p>Kate said Dickinson had some commercial flooding as well. Because the towns are situated below sea level, they can&#8217;t drain and wind up inundated when the bayous back up.</p><p>&#8220;This was just one small area of many that were flooded,&#8221; she explained.</p><p><strong>&#8216;We will do it again&#8217;</strong></p><p>Kate said she found many of the flood victims to be upbeat and determined to come back from the flooding.</p><p>&#8220;They were definitely very appreciative of all the volunteers who came to help,&#8221; she said. &#8220;As volunteers, we don&#8217;t feel we are doing all that much, but the people were really grateful.&#8221;</p><p>Kate said she would see many of the same people on a daily basis and as the recovery went on, they seemed to get more and more positive and optimistic.</p><p>&#8220;They seemed to be figuring out what they had to do and how to get there,&#8221; Kate said.</p><p>More than 6,000 Red Cross volunteers have been dispatched to the flooded regions in Texas, Louisiana and Florida, she said. She encourages anyone interested in volunteering to contact their local Red Cross office.</p><p>&#8220;From all the reports, this will be a bad hurricane season,&#8221; Kate said. &#8220;The are always opportunities to volunteer. And Jim and I will help get them ready to go.&#8221;</p><p>Kate said volunteers will be needed for a long time.</p><p>&#8220;This was definitely the right decision for us,&#8221; Kate said. &#8220;We can always take another vacation. This was the right time for us and we will do it again.&#8221;</p><p>The Crowleys are retired and have been Red Cross-certified volunteers for years.</p><style>
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<div class="neCaption">Tunkhannock&#8217;s Jim and Kate Crowley, at left and center, recently returned from volunteering with the Red Cross to help flood victims in Texas. While there, they met Barry Abromovage, who graduated from Wyoming Area High School and moved to Bristol, Va., in 1973. Abromavage, who still has family in the area, was the kitchen supervisor on the Crowleys&#8217; assignment.  </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/web1_Crowleys-in-Texas.jpg</photo0><caption0>Tunkhannock&#8217;s Jim and Kate Crowley, at left and center, recently returned from volunteering with the Red Cross to help flood victims in Texas. While there, they met Barry Abromovage, who graduated from Wyoming Area High School and moved to Bristol, Va., in 1973. Abromavage, who still has family in the area, was the kitchen supervisor on the Crowleys&#8217; assignment.  </caption0><photoCredit0>Submitted Photo </photoCredit0></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p>By Bill O&#8217;Boyle</p><p>boboyle@www.timesleader.com</p></bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta><p>Reach Bill O&#8217;Boyle at 570-991-6118 or on Twitter @TLBillOBoyle.</p></shirttailMeta></div>

Tunkhannock couple back home after volunteering in Texas