Sick, frail struggle in storm's aftermath

NEW YORK -- Some of society's most vulnerable people -- the elderly, the disabled and the chronically ill -- have been pushed to the brink in the powerless, flood-ravaged neighborhoods struggling to recover from superstorm Sandy.

The storm didn't just knock out electricity and destroy property when it came ashore in places like the Far Rockaway section of Queens. It disrupted the fragile support networks that allowed the neighborhood's frailest residents to get by.

Here, the catastrophe has closed pharmacies, kept home-care aids from getting to elderly clients and made getting around in a wheelchair impossible. The city has recorded at least two deaths of older men in darkened buildings.

For some living in the disaster zone, it has been too much.

When a team of medics and National Guardsmen turned up at Sheila Goldberg's apartment tower in Far Rockaway on Friday to check on the well-being of residents, floor by floor, the 75-year-old burst into tears and begged for help caring for her 85-year-old husband.

"This is a blessing. I'm at my wit's end," she sobbed.

Her husband, Irwin, has a pacemaker, wears a colostomy bag and needs her help to do almost everything.

For days, the building had no heat or electricity. There were no open stores to buy food. Until the end of the week, there was no water or elevators either, meaning residents like the Goldbergs, on the 25th floor, had to cart water up the steps just to flush the toilet. A stench permeates much of the building.

"I'm running out of my blood-pressure medication. We're both going to drop dead in this apartment," Sheila said. The medical team said it would make arrangements to transfer Irwin to a medical facility, at least temporarily.

City and federal officials and a growing army of volunteers are trying hard to make sure families like that don't fall into despair. Their efforts come alongside relief workers, donations, volunteers and demolition crews who flocked to New York and New Jersey in recent days to lend a hand.

Paramedics from throughout the country fanned out across the Rockaways this weekend to check on shut-ins and anyone else who might need help.

The going was slow. In their first three hours, the teams had gone through five high-rise towers. Several people were taken to the hospital. Others were provided water, food, blankets or prescription medications.

Yet, there have been rays of hope. In Newark, N.J., an Amtrak train arrived pulling a boxcar filled with donations from New Orleans.

Fuel lines remained long, but they were only a shade of the nightmare of recent days. Some gas stations on Staten Island had 20 cars in line Saturday afternoon.

Most power was expected to be restored in New Jersey over the weekend, and the utility that serves New York City and suburban Westchester County said it has restored electricity to 98 percent of the 1 million homes and businesses that lost power in the storm and a subsequent nor'easter.

Power problems remained unresolved on New York's Long Island, where about 300 people staged an angry protest at an office of the beleaguered Long Island Power Authority. Nearly 138,000 of its customers still didn't have power Saturday.

Amid the drudgery and heartbreak of cleanup came one special moment for Joanne McClenin, who had 5 feet of water in Staten Island home.

On Wednesday, her husband returned to their house to find someone had placed Joanne's 1930 baptism certificate from St. Anthony's Church in Manhattan. It had a smudge of mud on it.

The certificate had been stored in a file cabinet of her late parents' belongings, stored in a shed in their yard. The water from Sandy swept it away.

"It felt like my father was watching me," she said.