To beat the coronavirus, her philosophy is all hands on deck!
A brave nurse sailed hundreds of miles from Virginia to the Big Apple — where she now lives on a 50-foot boat in the East River — to help the city’s overrun hospitals fight the crisis, she told The Post.
Rachel Hartley, 26, of Lynchburg was inspired to embark on the 260-mile voyage after seeing heartbreaking reports about the city’s high death toll last month.
“I was hearing how badly New York City had been hit — and the area I was in wasn’t nearly as bad,” said Hartley. “That really pulled on my heart. I thought, I have to go help.”
The registered nurse, who has a background in intensive care, quit her job at a local hospital last month and signed up for one at NYU Langone Brooklyn, where she now works four night shifts a week treating COVID-19 patients.
To avoid a potentially virus-risky airplane flight — and to ensure she’d have a place to stay in real estate-competitive Brooklyn — she and her husband Taylor set sail in their four-bedroom Beneteau boat, aptly named Turning Points, on April 10.
“It wasn’t a typical vacation sail; it was cold and windy,” she said. “It took a lot of planning to make sure wind wasn’t strong or that we’d be sailing into a storm.”
On April 12, after a two-day journey, she spotted the Statue of Liberty while sailing into New York Harbor.
“I got emotional. The statue really had an impact on me,” she told The Post.
Hartley and her husband soon anchored at One° 15 Brooklyn Marina in Brooklyn Heights, where its deputy CEO, Estelle Lau, allowed them to dock for free because they’d come to fight the coronavirus crisis. Thanks to the company’s generosity, they’re able to avoid $10,000-$12,000 in monthly fees, Hartley said.
Hartley now works four 12-hour night shifts a week, including treating patients with COVID-19 in the ER, she said.
Matthew McDermott
“It’s the hardest working environment I’ve ever been in. There are so many people so sick and just ravaged by this disease. It really surprised me,” she said. “It’s been difficult.”
The work has been exhausting but highly rewarding, Hartley said.
“My ultimate desire is to give people help and love. For me, going to the epicenter of a pandemic was the best way to do that,” she said.
