Alana Stott said she’s slept just a few hours since Saturday.
The mother of three from Rancho Mission Viejo is a security expert who has been fielding WhatsApp and social media requests from Americans stranded in the Middle East seeking to get back to the United States. The calls and requests have been non-stop since the U.S. first launched its strike against Iran, she said, and by Thursday, she guessed she’d fielded more than a hundred.
Most of the people calling, Stott said, are Americans who were either traveling on vacation or business or are college students in Qatar, Kuwait, the Arab Emirates, Iraq and Israel.
Stott and her husband, Dean, who is former British Special Forces, operate SCI Security LLC, and are specialists in security evacuations. With at least 15 years of experience, they have helped hundreds of people flee from devolving and dangerous conflicts, Stott said. In some cases, they are in the trenches with those they are rescuing and in this case, they are working remotely, assisting people in getting home, she said.
They also have a foundation, the Blue Rose Foundation, that works against human trafficking. And Dean Stott co-hosted the Netflix show “Toughest Forces on Earth.”
“I’m trying to juggle as much as I can and make sure I get sleep where I can,” Stott said. “I’m not very good at saying ‘No,’ to people.”
Much of her work the last few days has been gathering intel on available flights, safe routes to airports and transportation options across the region from reliable, known people, Stott said.
The U.S. State Department estimates about 1 million Americans are in the Middle East, with thousands actively trying to depart amid widespread flight cancellations and airspace closures. About 20,000 Americans have returned home, an official said Thursday, adding 8,500 alone arrived on Wednesday.
Officials have reported that there are additional U.S.-affiliated charter flights expected to depart from the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Israel.
“Because we’ve done it quite a few times, we can see what happening and what’s moving,” Stott said, adding that along with challenges of the vast geographic region, there is the “panic and fear” among people there who are also dealing with confusing and conflicting information.
The Stotts aren’t newcomers to helping people evacuate. They first happened into it, Stott said, when her husband was in Libya in 2011 and she was already working in security and the Arab Spring protests escalated into a civil war against Muammar Qaddafi’s 42-year rule.
“That was our first taste of government collapse and people being left in countries,” she said. “I would be home doing the logistics and planning, and any bookings we needed to do. It was more intelligence-based, and he was doing the groundwork.”
Stott said the couple also helped people leave Afghanistan amid the tumult when the United States pulled out, and from Israel following the Oct. 7, 2023, attack by Hamas. “Whenever something like this happens, we have to move quickly.”
One religious studies group the couple helped return home to Orange County from Israel now has people trying again to get back, Stott said. And an Orange County couple and their friend were in a security bunker in Jerusalem on Thursday, waiting to get word of a flight out, she said.
What’s making it harder this time, Stott said, is that her husband isn’t “boots on the ground,” so all their assistance is from afar.
Most of those she’s talked to have said they are being well taken care of, Stott added.
“I’m speaking to people in Dubai and the U.E., and in general, they’re treating them very well,” she said. “In the hotels, they’re doing everything they can to keep them comfortable, but a lot of people are sitting in airports. Or they’ve been moved to Oman and Egypt without real plans and no flights booked.”
So far, Stott said, they successfully helped some people fly out of Dubai to Munich and London. In those cases, they were booked on several flights before they actually got on an outgoing plane.
The group from Orange County that’s hunkered down in Jerusalem, Stott said, nearly got talked into taking a car with people they didn’t know to Egypt.
“My advice was that, ‘You’re safe where you are right now,’” she said, happy they listened to her.
By midday Thursday, Stott said she was seeing some flights becoming available.
“It’s changing every minute,” she said. “I had one flight canceled, but you’ve got to be really quick.”