People call natural disasters "acts of God."

The Rev. Vicki Rucker has a different perspective that she shared with her volunteer group after their working trip to New Orleans:

Hurricane Katrina was an act of nature, she told them. But the response, the caring, the help, the thousands of volunteers working to rebuild New Orleans, that's the real "act of God," she said.

Nine volunteers from Bismarck's First Presbyterian Church paid their own way to New Orleans on Oct. 6-13 to work at rebuilding two houses there through the auspices of Presbyterian Disaster Assistance, which coordinates the efforts of volunteer teams from around the country.

Jay and Sandra Cofell decided that this trip would be their way of celebrating their 25th wedding anniversary, instead of buying things they don't need, Jay Cofell said. Barb and Winston Satran, Ruth Beachey, Kathy Wachter, Dave and Alice Nix, and Rucker, a pastor at First Presbyterian, were the rest who went. And they can't wait to go again.

Katrina, which turned everything in people's lives into debris, was an extremely emotional time, said volunteer Jay Cofell.

"Anybody would be moved," he said. "Touching others at the basic level, the people you help become like family," he said.

"We felt we had had made a difference," Beachey said.

Trying to get a handle on the enormity of the disaster is impossible, but the group offered the images that stayed with them after their return.

Many affected families are still living around the South and even further away, some still in FEMA trailers, some with relatives. Many streets looked desolate, they said. Here and there, a pioneer has been the first to move back to the deserted street of his or her old neighborhood.

"We got a sense of roots, people were really rooted to this place, they really wanted to return," Jay Cofell said.

Those who have returned often want to tell their stories over and over, and the group believes that part of its work there was to be listeners, he said.

About 300,000 homes were damaged, taking on 9 feet to 13 feet of water, Barb Satran said; 38,000 homes still need to be addressed, Winston Satran said. They were told that the rebuilding of New Orleans will take 10 to 15 years.

As the rebuilding goes on, houses are being gutted, all the soft inner parts removed, including plumbing and electrical, leaving just the shell to be rebuilt on the inside, or sometimes down to the slab, Jay Cofell said. Some are being rebuilt on stilts with metal studs for termite protection, others at their original elevation, he said.

People haul building debris to the street, where trucks come by at various times to remove it. Others pick through the debris to salvage the metal from the wreckage. Windows are open during daytime but boarded up when the work stops at night to keep out scavengers.

"It's easy to get lost because there are no street signs," Barb Satran said.

During their week in New Orleans, the group logged a total of 324 volunteer hours on the two houses. The group, ranging in age from late 40s to 66, honed some skills and learned a few new ones. On a nearly completed house, they spent their time on trim work, caulking, painting, texturing and attaching doors. They also installed a lot of insulation and attached a lot of drywall, Rucker said.

The owners of one home were so excited they brought the group a cooler of pop and water every day, and a real Southern-fried chicken dinner one day, Barb Satran said.

A lot of good things are going on, Winston Satran said. Businesses have donated tools and supplies, and he's impressed by the cleanup jobs done so far.

Barb Satran was struck by a symbol painted on unfinished houses, a circle divided into four quadrants. The quadrants list how many died there, where people were rescued from (attic, window, etc.), the date, and a code for who rescued them.

When a house is finished, that is finally painted over, she said.

(Reach reporter Karen Herzog at 250-8267 or karen.herzog@;bismarcktribune.com.)