As people wait for Kīlauea's 43rd eruption episode, some Hawaiʻi Island residents are still dealing with the aftermath of the 41st episode. Team Rubicon, a veteran-led volunteer group, has been helping with repair and recovery through operation “Tephra Falling.”
The nonprofit humanitarian organization helps communities before, during and after disasters, and has been in Hawaiʻi for over a decade. The team, made up of a mix of local volunteers and folks who flew in from the continent, went to Volcano to help residents clean and repair their water catchment systems.
Bill Terrill, Team Rubicon’s incident commander for this operation, said that during the eruption episodes, ash and tephra fell on residents’ roofs, which poses a risk of water contamination and could plug their drainage systems.
“Anything that hits the roof or the gutters has a possibility of going into those holding tanks, and the material – the ash and tephra – has some acidity to it and can block systems in there, so it's not good,” Terrill said.
“We get up on the roofs and either brush them down or blow them down, clear the gutters out so that there's actually a free flow for the water to come from the roofs, through the downspouts, and into their catchment systems.”
Terrill said the group worked with the Volcano Emergency Response Team, Salvation Army, the Hawaiʻi County Civil Defense Agency, and the Red Cross. Team Rubicon functions on a donation-based system and partners with local agencies to make its services come at no cost to the residents.
“There’s this great outpour of joy when we get there and do what we do. The folks that we tend to target would be elderly, disabled, low-income folks – people that definitely wouldn't be able to take care of it on their own,” Terrill said.
The team is working to repair about 20 homes’ water catchment systems this week. Terrill said they are on standby for future eruption episodes.
Those interested in volunteering for other operations can do so on the Team Rubicon website.
