Procurement Services Senior Buyer

When he first heard the news of the fire, Donnie Mongold's first thought was Oh my gosh, and then he immediately began worrying about the personal items he had lost and preparing to give all of those things up. He convinced himself that they were only material possessions and he could live without them, but his mind was flooded with what-ifs. He arrived at Medical Arts East at around 1 a.m. on Monday morning, and realized that the bottom floor, where his office was, was intact. Mongold's heart went out to all the people who had offices on the top level, because it was apparent that they had really big losses.

Mongold says, strangely enough, I was able to save the majority of my personal items. The only thing sentimental I lost was a collector's 9/11 watch I bought online. And that item seemed to have walked, because it was on a shelf with many other patriotic items and nothing else was missing or damaged.

The next day, he and many others were back at work, setting up temporary offices in the facilities management building with the assistance of Towana Moore.

From there, they started gathering replacement copiers, faxes, printers and computers. By mid-morning, they were able to get into the building to start the salvaging process, and by the second day they were temporarily placed in the Williamson Training Lab. As of around Dec. 10, they had moved into One Court Square and have pretty much made [them]selves at home.

Everyone's workload was affected as a result of the fire, but Mongold says We were committed to continue keeping on with the existing workload and continue our salvaging efforts as well as take inventory of losses and replace what was lost.

Mongold is proud of how much everyone pulled together in all of the efforts and how well we got along in such close quarters in the Williamson Lab, and also commented that it as a wonderful experience having Associate Vice President Towana Moore involved in the recovery efforts. He found that It would be hard to explain or put in words what her support [had] done for everyone's morale.

He would also like to thank telecom and the facilities management maintenance workers for helping to salvage items and then setting them up in temporary offices, as well as everyone who provided loaner equipment and who shipped all of their belongings around town.