If you think one person can't make a difference...

Coordination of rescue and relief efforts is the key to saving lives after a disaster. I know that. Yet the most fascinating stories about the Haitian earthquake are the ones about individuals who manage to make a difference despite the odds.

Most are doctors, nurses and emergency workers. Their work is heroic. But some who make a difference are ordinary folks. Here are some of their stories:

--Cara and Kevin Boone of Port Orange borrowed a plane and rescued not only the two Haitian children they were already in the process of adopting but also 24 others from the Angel House Orphanage, as described by the Daytona Beach News-Journal.

--Mike Wnek, a developer from Auburndale, flew to the Dominican Republic, rented a flatbed truck and wangled deep discounts on food and water. As The St. Petersburg Times reports, he pushed the bounty through potholed gravel roads across the border, all the way to Port-au-Prince, bringing the first supplies to part of the city.

--Another Times story profiles Robert Olin Feister, 80, who lived in upscale Tierra Verde but spent most of his time in Haiti, doing what he could to brighten the lives of children. Feister died in the quake.