Assessment Complete. On the Road Home

Hoping this update finds you all with power and showered though it appears half the outages, 300,000 as of this morning, are still not repaired. Both our wives have been without all week so we're glad to be getting home tonight and able to assess the situation up there first hand. We completed our assessment across West Louisiana and East Texas yesterday afternoon, stayed with Tim in Mandeville again last night and are nearly to Birmingham on our way home right now.

There is a confirmed need of our type of help and there are several good options for us to partner with as their readiness matures. There are conflicting media and aid organization reports about the disaster area. As usual, what we’ve seen first hand indicates an average of what you may be hearing and what people have been emailing me. There are often those who exaggerate a situation intentionally or not, for good motives or bad. I am working hard to backcheck any information against what I can see and people who have proven trustworthy in our work.

The area effected and the population density of those not able to live in their homes is much smaller than we found after Katrina. Maybe 5-10% or so. There are probably many more casualties than have been reported as searches are just beginning. Barrier island communities where tens of thousands did not evacuate have been wiped clean in some sections by the storm. Those still out there continue to be evacuated by boat and helicopter to shelters. One man with a boat was allowed through a checkpoint where we were stopped yesterday to rescue friends who had called him from their roof in High Island.

This is no Katrina. None-the-less, there is extensive damage. Wind damage is probably about the same as at home in Ohio actually. Lots of limbs down and power out, but there were a lot of electrical crews in staging areas along I-10 in Louisiana and Texas not working. About half the electrical grid damage we saw was actively being worked on. Many areas of Huston have power restored, even right down next to Galveston Bay where the Eye came ashore. There are a few roofs missing significant areas of shingles and a lot of branches down, but the locals are pretty much cleaning that up.


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Flooding is a different situation, though, entirely. There are two categories of that. The worst hit places on the barrier islands, we could not get to, but photos on the news from the President’s visit yesterday show large areas where one in twenty houses, maybe less remain. The debris and even the piers that the house sat on are washed away. Nothing is left. That isn’t something we can help fix any time soon.

I want to head off a misconception for you that I had myself. Galveston Island, on the whole, is not a wealthy resort community. Many poor to middle class live on the island in ancestral homes that have been damaged or removed by the storm. 1/4 of people live below the poverty line. 14% are over 65. These are the kind of people we focus on helping.

There is a narrow line of flooding, much of it rural that we can work on immediately once we have a base of operations to work from. The largest pocket is near the space center along the eastern edge of Houston near Galveston bay. League City, Texas City, and places like that. Rural areas around Orange Texas and South East of Port Arthur are flooded, but mostly didn’t get the wave action that wiped away the homes that were more exposed to the sea. There is a low density of damaged homes in many areas, but everything in Bridge City was flooded.

We saw several distribution locations (news reports 60) FEMA has set up around Houston. The Southern Baptists were setting up a feeding station at Orange which is an appropriate location. They also have others on the way in according to their email update yesterday. Except for the most devastated areas where authorities rightly want to encourage people to leave because they are just unhealthy, people are not going hungry or thirsty that we can tell. Stores and gas stations are open in Houston and opening hourly in other areas as power is restored. Walmart in Port Arthur was open without power. Target in Friendswood was giving out truckloads of ice and water. The Red Cross is distributing meals. The Houston food bank is looking for additional assistance as their demand is way up, but still is functioning.

The primary need that we can fill as soon as a hosting organization is ready for us is mucking and maybe a little chain saw cleanup work.

Southeast Church of Christ in Friendswood, a Houston suburb may also host a relief effort for that area. They are in a suburban area and have great facilities for us to use and they are only 30 minutes from most damaged areas including Galveston and Bolivar Peninsula areas that were the hardest hit.

I’ve made contact with two churches in Nederland/Port Arthur about hosting operations for areas around Beaumont, Orange, Bridge City, etc.

Hilltop is discussing the possibility of hosting in Sulfur, Louisiana and investigating the areas we hit this week as well.

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Their decision of where to set up shop will impact our decision as we know the four needs of volunteers, work, showers, place to sleep, and food will be managed.

We’ve left business cards at churches that look suitable where we couldn’t find anyone and spoken with quite a few contacts investigating the needs and our options to work down there so it’s been a productive trip. The situation is still very new and fluid, as these things are, so no definite plans yet.

I still want to plan a tentative trip for Saturday, September 27. This would be a two day drive with an overnight each way, work for 5 days, and return home the following weekend, October 4 and 5.

Servants Unite!
John McGuire and Mark Day