The urgent update from the Peace Corps landed abruptly in the email inboxes of volunteers on March 15: It was time to evacuate.

Miguel Garcia, a 27-year-old volunteer leader for the corps in the Dominican Republic, had just reassured someone that the corps would be staying on the job. With a sinking heart, he read the detailed instructions three times.

The tears would come later. Now he had a job to do.

He had 24 hours to get 32 volunteers scattered across the country to Santo Domingo, the capital. Several of his volunteers were about eight hours away in hard-to-reach communities near the border, with limited internet and cell service.