American Red Cross

Check out the “Be Disaster Ready” tab to download brochures with tips to be prepared for a disaster

The Commander of the 374th Air Wing and subject matter experts discuss recent events in Japan with the base population answering questions and quelling concerns

Yokota Town Hall Meeting 3/14/2011 from AFN Tokyo on Vimeo.

QUESTION: What is the American Red Cross doing to assist the Japanese community?

ANSWER: The American Red Cross is currently in discussions with the Japanese Red Cross to assess their needs and see how we can help. The Japanese Red Cross has extraordinary disaster response capabilities. They have been operating since 1887, and they run multiple hospitals and blood collection services across the country.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) is assisting Japan with restoring family links.

The American Red Cross has a warehouse in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, fully stocked with pre-positioned relief supplies for 5,000 families, and it has disaster specialists on standby. These supplies can be used for people in U.S. territories or other Pacific nations.

The Japanese Red Cross continues to assess needs and has deployed 62 national disaster response medical teams with more than 400 staff to affected areas. The Japanese Red Cross has not requested international assistance at this time; however, the American Red Cross is in direct contact about their ongoing needs.

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QUESTION: I’m concerned about my loved ones. What can I do?

ANSWER:

NON-MILITARY, U.S. CITIZENS: The best way to contact or locate U.S. citizens living or traveling in Japan is to contact the U.S. Department of State, Office of Overseas Citizens Services, at 1-888-407-4747 or (202) 647-5225 (to call the 888 number from a DSN, dial 809-463-3376 first). The American Red Cross Safe and Well website has been updated to include the disaster dropdown “Japanese Earthquake.” People in the area can register themselves on the site as being safe and well and families in the States can check to see if their loved ones are registered on the site: http://www.redcross.org/safeandwell

MILITARY: The military has reported that all their personnel are accounted for, and all Red Cross staff on military bases are also fine. As is the normal practice for a disaster, Red Cross station managers are currently in the military Emergency Operations Centers for their respective installations and assisting as needed.  The American Red Cross Safe and Well website has been updated to include the disaster dropdown “Japanese Earthquake.” Military members can register themselves on the site as being safe and well and families of Military members stationed overseas can check to see if their loved ones are registered on the site: www.redcross.org/safeandwell

JAPANESE OR OTHER NATIONALITIES: The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), working closely with the Japanese Red Cross, has launched a special Family Links website to help people seeking to re-establish contact with family members and friends. People in Japan and abroad can register on the website to inform their family and friends that they are safe and provide their current contact details, while those looking for people can check the list for information. They can also register the names of family members and friends, encouraging them to get in touch. The website is at http://www.icrc.org/familylinks. Even though communication networks are overloaded right now, the situation may change and access to mobile networks and the internet may improve.

Other Family Linking Resources: The Google Person Finder site is available: http://japan.person-finder.appspot.com/?lang=en

If you have the mobile phone number of your family member in the affected areas, you may utilize the following services to check whether he/she has registered his/her message(s) on this service. Services are available in English and Japanese.

DoCoMo: http://dengon.docomo.ne.jp/Einoticelist.cgi?es=0

SoftBanK: http://dengon.softbank.ne.jp/pc-e1.jsp

Willcom: http://dengon.willcom-inc.com/dengon/Top.do?language=E

EZWeb: http://dengon.ezweb.ne.jp/E/service.do?p1=dmb221

Please note that when you enter the mobile phone number for search on the webpage, you should enter the number without any dashes.

Ms. Sherri Brown, American Red Cross Senior Vice President for Service to the Armed Forces, visited Yokota AB hospital on October 12, 2010 for the opening of the new Red Cross office that will help to serve hospital Red Cross volunteers.

Col. Harvis (MDG/CC) says a few words before the ribbon cutting

Sherri Brown speaking to hospital Red Cross volunteers

The cutting of the ribbon

Stepping into the new office

Celebrating the event with some cake

American Red Cross Senior Vice President  for Service to the Armed Forces, Ms. Sherri L. Brown, will be arriving to Yokota on Sunday, October 10 as part of her annual Far East trip. While visiting Yokota she will attend a ribbon cutting ceremony for the opening of a Red Cross office at the hospital as well as meeting with Senior Leadership on base.

Ms. Sherri Brown began her career first serving as an active duty officer in the United States Coast Guard, then continuing service as a reservists at various assignments. Ms. Brown joined the American Red Cross as Senior Vice President for Service to the Armed Forces in August of 2008. Within this role she provides oversight and direction for worldwide American Red Cross programs and services for military members, veterans and their families.

Most Recently in the summer of 2010, Ms. Brown served a two-month active duty assignment as Deputy Director for External Affairs at the Unified Area Command for the Deepwater Horizon BP Oil Spill Response in New Orleans, Louisiana.

The photo gallery has been updated with images from the Akiruno Summer Festival.  Head on over to the Akiruno Photo Album to take a look

Come join us at the Akiruno Summer Festival. We’re dancing with the Tanabata dancers in the parade. The festival goes on from noon ’till 9pm. See you there!

Yokota Red Cross volunteers arrived in force today readying vacant tower apartments for contingency use. Dozens of families were forced to evacuate from east side tower units after a flash flood unexpectedly dumped over 3.5 inches of rain in under an hour on July 5th. The heavy rainfall caused flooding of several east side tower basements where water levels reached as high as midway through basement stairwells and engulfed at least two vehicles. Power failures occurred during the downpour, some areas for a few hours, others remain in darkness which is, in part, responsible for the evacuations.

Red Cross volunteers stepped up to the challenge by cleaning and preparing multiple vacant tower units for evacuees. Some families have been able to return to their homes as power, water and fire suppression systems are restored. When those families leave, Red Cross personnel ensure those, now vacant units, are ready and habitable for new families on the waiting list.

The dayroom of this tower continues to be staffed by willing volunteers. If you are interested in assisting, please visit the Yokota Red Cross office or contact our volunteer chair through this website.

Sure, you can check out what’s happening at Yokota Red Cross by stopping in at our office or logging on to YokotaRedCross.org. But, did you know that there are many other ways to keep in touch? You’re always on the move, so we’ve created ways to make things easier when you want to find out what’s going on at the YRC. Without further adieu, here it goes:

1 – iPhone / iPod Touch – YokotaRedCross.org is nicely formatted just for the iPhone/iPod Touch. Just point your device’s browser to http://www.yokotaredcross.org. It’s set to “mobile device friendly” by default. If you want to view the original page, simply scroll to the bottom to change the settings switch.

2 – Facebook Fan Page – We’ve set up a special Facebook Fanpage that streams all of our current news as it happens. If you are a Facebook addict, this option may be just right for you. Simply log in to Facebook, browse over to http://www.facebook.com/pages/Yokota-Red-Cross/339091423693 (or search for YokotaRedCross) and “Become a Fan!”. This works great on the Facebook iPhone app as well.

3 – Twitter – Do you Tweet? Follow short versions of our latest posts at http://www.twitter.com/yokotaredcross. For the iPhone, you can use Twitterific, TwitBird, TweetDeck or any of the Twitter apps that allow you to follow Twitter pages like ours.

4 – RSS – It stands for Really Simple Syndication. On the upper right hand side of this page you will see this icon. Just click on it and you will see a “feed” of our articles. There are many RSS readers out there including many that may be built in to the browser or operating system you use.

March 2, 2010
At Yokota West Elementary

We would like to invite YOU to be a
Guest Reader during the school day on March 2nd!

If you are interested in joining the fun at YWES,
just email Cheryl Johnson and let her know 3 things:

1. What time is best for you?
2. What grade level do you prefer (K–5)?
3. Which 2 Dr. Seuss books will you read?

That’s all there is to it!
We would be happy to supply the books if needed.

Please RSVP by February 22nd
or contact Cheryl Johnson with questions
at 225-8388 or cheryl.johnson@pac.dodea.edu