Some of Palm Beach County's own heroes are back with their families after spending nearly two weeks assisting Monroe County with emergency operations in the Florida Keys following Hurricane Irma.
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"Being apart from your family obviously is very difficult, but when you see the families and what they’re going through, a lot of the families were separated. Some got separated during the storm," said Douglas McGlynn, PBCFR district chief and incident commander for Islamorada for the Region 7 All Hazards Critical Incident Management Team.
A caravan of emergency trucks drove into the Palm Beach County Fire Rescue headquarters off Pike Road around 5 p.m. Sunday.
"I love that he’s helping out the community down there in the Keys and everyone out there who’s struggling right now," said Ryan McGlynn, Douglas McGlynn's son.
Excited family members greeted the members of the Region 7 All Hazards Critical Incident Management Team Sunday.
"He’s definitely our hero, but we miss him and we can’t wait to have him back," said Tina McGlynn, wife of Douglas McGlynn.
The team was in the Keys for 12 days where they helped with specific emergency operations roles, facilitated radio communications for emergency workers, helped get messages to the public and assisted with other duties.
"(Sometimes we were) writing a note on a piece of paper and driving it down 30 miles to make sure the other town knows what’s going on is what we were dealing with," Douglas McGlynn said.
"We had to break it all the way down to the basics," said Jason Haythorn, a lieutenant with PBCFR and public information officer for the Region 7 All Hazards Critical Incident Management Team. "How are we going to get this info out to these people because they desperately need it? They need to know that we’re here to help. What do they need from us?"