More Than a Passion: Red Crosser Vicki Pelton Shares Her Life’s Work

Born and raised in California, Vicki Pelton was deeply inspired to help people after a nine-month trip to Africa. Seeing poverty-stricken people tugged at her heartstrings and she felt compelled deeply to give back in some way. Once back on U.S. soil, the Mountain View resident signed up with the Palo Alto Area Chapter of the Red Cross (currently known as the Silicon Valley Chapter), beginning her 34-year journey as a Red Cross volunteer.

Over the years, Vicki has learned and fulfilled multiple roles, or Group-Activity-Positions (GAP) with the Red Cross, including Recovery, Logistics, and Disaster Services Technology (DST). She enjoys the fact that the Red Cross constantly creates new positions and provides opportunities to train for those new roles. She just finished training for a position within the Disaster Cycle Services team as part of the E3 initiative: Every Shelter, Every Day and Every Need. This initiative streamlines the supply distribution for all shelters during a Disaster Response Operation.

While active within her own chapter, she also takes the opportunity to help elsewhere. Vicki has deployed to more than 30 Disaster Relief Operations across the country. During her first year as a volunteer, and thanks to her freelance work in computer programming, she was able to deploy for six months to six different disasters, one month each.

Vicki’s first deployment was to assist Florida residents impacted by Hurricane Andrew, in 1992. She remembers it as, “the most devastating disaster that ever hit the U.S.” Thousands of people were left homeless, and thousands of homes were destroyed. Red Cross volunteers nationwide responded to help.

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