HATTIESBURG, Miss. ( WHLT ) – Mississippi Red Cross workers and church groups are joining forces to help victims of Hurricane Helene .

The Mississippi Chapter of the American Red Cross will deploy crews to assist in providing shelter during the storm.

“In Florida and Georgia, they currently have evacuation shelters opening to prepare. They’re also providing hot meals at those locations for the clients that are currently there. They’re preparing our vehicles, preparing all of the supplies that will be needed in case we have to go out and distribute emergency supplies out to the field,” said Zoe Anderson, Community Disaster Program manager at the American Red Cross in Hattiesburg.

Shelter volunteers are trained to keep people safe and as comfortable as possible during a disaster. After the storm, the Red Cross will begin on-the-ground recovery efforts.

“We have recovery caseworkers that would be working with the impacted clients. We also have our external relations teams that go out and work with nonprofit, with other nonprofit organizations, with the local government to provide those services,” said Anderson.

Local churches, including Trinity Baptist Church in Laurel, are gathering donations to take to hurricane victims.

“We’ve responded, I believe, for the last 10 years to any type of disasters, whether it be flood, tornado, hurricane. And it’s just our responsibility as servants to make sure that people have the items that they need to recover,” said Kurt Wagner with Trinity Baptist Church.

The church plans to take the donations to St. Petersburg, Florida.

“You need water. You need canned food, nonperishable food items. If you had children, small children, you’d need diapers, baby formula, baby food. Just something to get you by until you could get back on your feet again,” said Wagner.

Dixie and Southern Pine Electric also plan to deploy crews to Florida on Friday.

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