Armed with snow safety equipment, volunteers were out in full force for the past week, assisting authorities in helping those in need.
The Jordanian Adventurers, as the team of 12 call themselves, responded to the Public Security Department’s official radio station, Amen FM, initiative Nashmi (the brave one) At Your Service, and expressed their willingness and readiness to assist.
Team leader Ahmad Taieb said its members were well equipped, and prepared for the worst.
“We have four SUVs equipped with snow chains, ropes and a good amount of bread and water,” Taieb said, noting that the “Adventurers” were “ready” to face the severe snowstorm before it arrived.
The team includes “expert drivers” between the ages of 30 and 50, a photographer, and retired Special Forces men who are well trained to deal with emergencies and administer first aid, according to Taieb.
During the snowstorm, the team helped more than a dozen cases, mostly providing food and other essential supplies, and rescuing cars stuck in the snow, Taieb said, adding that “the professional photographer took pictures and documented the snow adventures.”
Ahmad Ghalayini, the team photographer, said he was able to capture most of the incidents the team encountered in videos and images, and published the majority online.
“When words can’t describe people’s agony or their gratitude, pictures say it all,” he noted.
Lt. Col. Maen Khasawneh, head of Amen FM radio station, told The Jordan Times that the Nashmi initiative was announced a day before the snowstorm, and the Jordanian Adventurers were among those who responded.
“The station worked 24 hours for six days, receiving calls for help from citizens either stranded by the snow or in need of heat and food,” Khasawneh said.
He added that the calls would be transferred to the team leader who would move “immediately” to provide assistance.
Recounting an incident that the “Adventurers” encountered on the fourth day of the snowstorm, Taieb said the team received a call from six women in the capital’s Jabal Hussein neighbourhood and “immediately, two cars drove from Tlaa Al Ali.”
He noted that after reaching the area, the women — friends and neighbours of a pregnant woman — told his team that they wanted to help satisfy her craving for knafeh (a traditional dessert consisting of fine pastry, melted cheese and pistachios).
“The pregnant woman badly needed to eat knafeh,” Taieb recalled.
“Of course we could not say ‘no’ to her.”
Established in 1998, the team, started providing voluntary aid programmes in the Kingdom’s south, mainly Wadi Musa and Wadi Rum, assisting hikers and tourists lost in the desert, according to Taieb.
“Ours is a work of passion for the Kingdom and its people.”
By Rula Samain
