Hurricane Matthew is wreaking havoc on Florida’s eastern coast. The storm also has 20 local nurses stranded.
40 University of Kansas Hospital employees were in Orlando to attend an international nursing convention. The convention was cut short when Hurricane Matthew hit land.
"As soon as everything was canceled, it was challenging to scramble and try to get all the airplane reservations made to try to get people home,” said Nurse Amanda Gartner. “So about half of our group made it out on Thursday and the rest of us are waiting out the storm."
Gartner said they’ve experienced high winds and intermittent rainfall, but the worst of the weather hit the coast.
They are all safe and doing well. As nurses, dealing with emergency situations is their specialty.
“This was just, kind of, not expected, but we were prepared to do it."
The rest of the employees hope to make it back to KC by Sunday, at the latest.
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Lexi Sutter can be reached at lexi.sutter@kshb.com.
