SNOW HILL - Coordinating the efforts of nearly 200 firefighters as they battled the Greene Natural Fibers blaze Wednesday and Thursday was a demanding task. So was feeding them.
Standing among hundreds of biscuits and bottles of water, Red Cross volunteers hustled through the night to attend to the needs of firefighters from across four counties.
Red Cross intern Marianne Koval came to Greene County from Wilson when it became apparent that fighting this fire was going to be an all-night affair.
She helped set up shop in a resident's front yard at 1 a.m. Thursday, working just down the street from the inferno that raged only yards away.
"We had to go to Wal-Mart for a lot of this," Koval said, gesturing to the mountains of drinks and bags of ice. Boxes of Bojangles' - doubtless the biggest order of the morning at the Snow Hill restaurant - were stacked nearby.
Koval said that while she's been to fires before, she's never seen one like this.
"At least it was a warmer night then it has been," she said.
Red Cross Disaster Chairman Bud Cayton said his group had spent at least $1,000 on food and other necessities for the beleaguered firefighters and law enforcement officers.
"A lot of people don't realize that that money comes from donations," Cayton said. "We get no government money at all."
Food and drinks were a welcome respite for the men, almost all volunteers who still had day jobs to go to after fighting fires all night.
One fireman with the Snow Hill Fire Department gave an enthusiastic thanks to the Red Cross workers as he walked on with a sausage biscuit and a little bit of caffeine in hand.
"It was definitely good to see," said Castoria Fire Chief Steve Marshburn, referring to the table of food set out by the big white van emblazoned with the familiar Red Cross logo.
Countless more firemen sat scattered around an area the size of several football fields, glad to have something to eat after hours of heat and stress.
"We made sure everyone who wanted something was fed," Koval said. "We even took a biscuit out to the deputy who was blocking the road down there."
Others took advantage of another necessity brought in for a firefighting operation this size: the portable toilet.
The effects of a night of battling the blaze clearly showed on the faces of firefighters as they shuffled by.
After downing a quick breakfast, two of them climbed into a nearby ambulance to try to get in a few winks before having to move on.
"It's been a long, long night," Koval said.
