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Cajun Navy Ground Force, with Camilo Andrade at the helm, helping islanders

By PAULETTE LeBLANC / pleblanc@breezenewspapers.com - | Jan 11, 2023

Camilo Andrade

According to Cajun Navy Ground Force Incident Commander Camilo Andrade, once you’re a Marine, you’re always a Marine. He’s a man, who by his own admission likes to get things done and he said he came here to work.

Andrade originally came to Pine Island just days following Hurricane Ian. On Jan. 3, he came back, from Jupiter, meeting up with youth from Celebration Church in Bristol, Tennessee, to help as many islanders as possible.

Andrade said the youth were as hard a working group of young people he’s had the pleasure of meeting and working with.

“After the storm I was looking to get down here, and the Cajun Navy welcomed me with open arms,” Andrade said, adding that other organizations had a waiting period before he could get to hurricane victims.

Andrade’s brand of leadership is made of a can-do attitude, feeling very strongly that if one is determined, nothing should hold them back. The person in charge is not the person with the title, he said, insisting the person in charge is the one leading the way.

Camilo Andrade, left, and one of his volunteer work crews on the island. PHOTO PROVIDED BY CAMILO ANDRADE

Unwilling to accept any accolades, Andrade insists he’s been the lucky one, having been fortunate enough to have met the people he has.

“Everyone is constantly saying nice things about me and that’s nice but, you know, God put me here and I’ve been surrounded by the greatest people — I mean God has brought the most amazing people into this area to work with me and without them I get the feeling it would take 10 times longer. The people who have come to this island and into this area to help out have been just amazing,” Andrade said.

The untold number of volunteers who’ve come to help since the hurricane have helped give away millions of dollars’ worth of supplies, he said, of working out in North Fort Myers. Of course, Pine Island locals have also joined the crew to lend a hand in the recovery, he said.

“We’ve had locals here that have volunteered with us for days and weeks at a time. We’ve had people come from Tampa, we’ve had people come from Miami, Palm Beach, it’s been an amazing experience because I’ve seen what America is really about — not what the cable news portrays it to be. People were in need, they put their hand out for help and I reached my hand out to help them and neither of us cared about politics, religion, race, color or any other damn thing — it was just good old-fashioned, Americans loving their neighbor and it’s just been a super experience,” Andrade said.

The response to different disasters around the country is what initially drew Andrade in the direction of the Cajun Navy to begin with, he said, adding that he’s interested in finding solutions, not excuses. Overall, the reward for him, he said, has been the people he’s been able to help out.

“We did a job yesterday for a woman in a wheelchair. She’s crippled and living in a field, in a tent. I put a tarp over the top of her tent because she wanted some shade and then we built her a privacy fence and a shower stall that she could use from her wheelchair.

“Another couple in their 70s are still living in their house and there’s mold everywhere — they were sleeping on their soaking wet mattress, they were putting plastic bags over it so they could sleep on it – they had like 5 feet of water in the place,” he continued. “They said they were standing on their countertop during the storm and had water up to their knees — to be able to go in and help those people out — they had nowhere to go so we cleaned the house out the best we could, we put up some air mattresses.

“They were both just ecstatic to have a place to sleep. I’ve been so blessed to have been able to help these people out. Everyone says thank you, thank you, but I think I’ve gotten more out of this than I gave anybody,” Andrade said.

The love, kindness and generosity from people has been overwhelming, Andrade said, admitting he’s never gone into an area like this one before. He believes with adequate funding, The Cajun Navy Ground Force would stay on Pine Island for a year or better.