All posts by lathamke

Today we head back to Indiana.  We woke up early and packed up our hotel rooms. Checking and double checking every corner to make sure we didn’t forget anything, and moving items from suitcase to suitcase making sure everything fit and was under the weight maximum for the airline.  There was one last stop we needed to make before heading to the airport: Whataburger.  Amanda said this Texas classic was on her list of places to dine while in the Lone Star State, so we picked up a few taquitos and honey butter chicken biscuits for the road.  Then we waved good bye to San Marcos and headed towards the airport.  This is the first year we didn’t have to stop and clean out the rental before returning it. Previous years our rental transported us muddy, sweaty and stinky as we conducted archeological exhumations.  This year the rental was spared the usual Febreeze bath before being returned.

When we got to the airport we huddled in a corner at our gate and discussed the tasks we need to complete in the upcoming few weeks.  Our work is far from over.  We have documents we need to make and submit to the appropriate agencies.  We have databases to update, emails to send and reflections to make.  Amanda and Justin will be taking over the NamUs database duties of our cases as Ryan transitions to his fellowship at the South Texas Human Rights Center.  He is already dedicating a lot of time to reviewing documents, databases, spreadsheets and other tasks that will better prepare him for his upcoming job.  Most of us slept on the flight home, thoroughly exhausted from our two weeks in Texas.  Since we were working all day, everyday we didn’t have much time to just stop and think about what we were doing and how this experience has impacted us.  Those reflections will begin to pour into our minds slowly over the next few days and weeks.

Just because we are home doesn’t mean the blog is over for the year.  We plan on submitting several more entries over the next week or so.  Please continue to check back daily for new entries!  Thank you to all of you that have followed us so far.  We appreciate your support and the awareness you are bringing to this humanitarian crisis.

~KEL

Today there was a flurry of activity at the lab.  We continued our work on skeletal analyses in the midst of many visitors.  There were news crews from Corpus Christie and msnbc.  They punctuated our work with questions and the clicks of their cameras.  But our hope is they will bring more awareness to the issues we face in identifying these individuals. This awareness may lead to funding, which is desperately needed for this work to progress faster.  It may also lead to a better understanding of the amount of work, organization and collaboration that go into the identification efforts.  In addition to the media presence we had another visitor today,  Deputy Don White from the Brooks County Sheriff Department.  We used our time with the visitors to teach as much as we could about the process.  We showed them what we were doing at every step and answered all of their questions.  The Corpus Christi Caller Times spent the entire day at the lab learning the different techniques we use to construct a biological profile, meeting with each task force and really trying to understand our efforts before writing about it.

Deputy Don sat at the analysis table with the UIndy team the whole day.  He asked great questions and helped us at every opportunity.  He shared stories of his recovery experiences and wanted to use his time at the lab to inform him when he goes on recoveries at the ranches in Brooks County.  He looked to see which bones and which features we used to address different questions about the individual.  He also provided us the opportunity to ask questions about the recoveries, the process he uses and the environment where the recoveries are taking place.  That information helps us better understand some of the patterns we are seeing regarding the bones.  It was another great day of collaboration and team effort.  As we were nearing the completion of our 7th case for the week, it started to storm.  Since the ranch road leading to the lab is prone to flooding we were asked to pack everything up and head out for the day.  But the camaraderie was already is full swing, so Don and Dr. Spradley joined us for dinner to continue the conversations about how we can work together as a team during this humanitarian crisis.  We took Amanda for her fist visit to Torchy’s Tacos. It was a good way to end a really productive day!

~KEL