Photo courtesy mahaffey tents and events
The Morial Convention Center in New Orleans has been transformed into a 1,000-bed hospital.
Who do you picture when you picture a hero? Perhaps a firefighter, rushing into a burning building, enters your mind. I experienced just this sort of heroism firsthand, last fall, when my husband’s and my Midtown home lit up from an electrical fire. The quickness of the Memphis Fire Department crew that evening stunned me, but what stays with me even more vividly is their compassion. One man, whose name I do not know, handed us a bottle of water so that our dogs could drink from our cupped hands. Those firefighters understood precisely what to do in order to keep us, and as much of our home as possible, safe.
Living in these pandemic days can feel a little like being in a fire that just won’t be snuffed. The best most of us can do is avoid it — we can deprive it of oxygen by preventing its insatiable desire to spread, but that’s about all. There is a certain quiet, collective heroism in everything we are not doing. There’s heroism in staying home, in keeping our distance, in wearing masks when we do need to draw near others.
But then there are those who are taking active steps each day to make the rest of us safer, and to sustain us during these difficult days. We decided to talk to several locals whose heroism takes different, but undeniable forms, for which they are uniquely qualified. Without question, we could have filled every page of this magazine with other local heroes’ stories.
— Anna Traverse Fogle, CEO & Editor in Chief
Photo courtesy mahaffey tents and events
The Morial Convention Center emergency hospital before COVID-19 patients began arriving.
New Orleans has seen a constant rise in coronavirus cases, reaching more than 5,600 by Easter Sunday, and has become an epicenter for COVID-19 in the United States.
When the beleaguered city called on assistance from around the country, they got help from Memphis. John*, an emergency health worker, volunteered, and Mahaffey Event & Tent Rentals provided equipment to transform the city’s Morial Convention Center into a field hospital to care for more than 1,000 non-critical patients.
“My family was concerned about me going there,” says John. “They were worried that I might get sick, and they didn’t want me to go. But someone has to be on the frontlines to fight this virus.”
He had initially been asked to deal with the growing pandemic in New York City towards the end of March. Right before his scheduled departure for the Big Apple, he was told that there were too many emergency responders assigned to that city. His reassignment was changed to New Orleans.
“I’ll miss my girlfriend and family, of course, but I felt like I had to take this opportunity to help contain the risk of spreading the coronavirus for people who are at-risk,” he says. “It’s important to help our brothers and sisters in times of need and show them some compassion.
He arrived on Sunday, April 5th, and when he got to the convention center, National Guard members were still setting up 1,000 individual tents, provided by Mahaffey for the anticipated lower-acuity patients.
“They were still setting up when I got here, but they were finished by Monday,” says John. “It was kind of a cluster getting it set up, but everyone has been in high spirits and has been very friendly and professional.”
When we spoke with John on April 8th, just two days after the makeshift hospital opened, he said that it had taken in around 40 patients, but expects many more in the coming weeks. “I haven’t seen any deaths yet, but I’ve heard of local firefighters going and picking up bodies of deceased coronavirus patients every day,” he says.
John says that the hospital staff is taking every precaution to make sure personnel remain safe, including providing adequate personal protection equipment like N95 masks, surgical gowns, shoe covers, and gloves.
Each day, John works 12-hour shifts to assist patients, and he says that he may continue to help out there for as long as the next three months, depending on the progression of coronavirus cases in New Orleans.
“I’ll miss my girlfriend and family, of course, but I felt like I had to take this opportunity to help contain the risk of spreading the coronavirus for people who are at-risk,” he says. “It’s important to help our brothers and sisters in times of need and show them some compassion. We have to try to keep this virus under control.”
