psychology of a disaster

Our last CERT class was about how to deal psychologically with a disaster. The lady who taught the class had been to help in Huricane Katrina and Ike, and also a tornado that happened in Colorado. She told us stories about some of the people and places she had seen and dealt with during these disasters.
She worked in Gulfport, MS during Katrina and the pictures I she showed were awful. I remembered some of the places and they looked nothing like they did when I was there. She told us a story about a woman who was standing in line to get help from FEMA and all at once she just broke down. She couldn't stand up she was crying so hard. Karrie went over to talk to her. She said are you okay, and the woman said "No, I killed my mother." Come to find out, this woman had picked up her kids and went over to her mothers house to talk her into evacuating with them. Her mother had lived through huricane camille and said she would not evacuate. All roads were leading out of gulfport. she left, and halfway out of the city she got a call from her mother who said she was scared and to come get her. She couldn't because none of the roads were going back into the city, and her mother ended up drowning in her home.