Alabama teams help with storm cleanup in Illinois

When violent thunderstorms and straight-line winds battered south-central Illinois July 21, residents weren’t able to estimate the untold millions in losses or guess when their lights might be turned back on. But one thing was certain: in Alabama, Baptists were readying their chain saws.

At press time, two disaster relief teams from Alabama — one from Tennessee River Baptist Association and one from Baldwin Baptist Association — were en route to the heavily damaged city of Mount Vernon, Ill., according to Tommy Puckett, director of disaster relief for the Alabama Baptist State Board of Missions. Another team from Sand Mountain Baptist Association was preparing to leave within the next day.

According to the North American Mission Board (NAMB), they join teams from Illinois, Arkansas, Tennessee, Indiana and Kentucky that also are working in the area to clear fallen trees and other debris left behind by the storm. Puckett said NAMB makes the requests for teams through the state coordinator.

“Every district doesn’t have chain saw teams, so the state coordinator calls a district who does and says, ‘Give me two of your teams,’ and the district coordinator then calls his associations,” Puckett explained.

David Patty, director of missions for Sand Mountain Association, got just such a call days after the storms hit and started readying a team immediately. But Patty didn’t have to start from scratch — he was pulling from a pool of 40 trained workers, not to mention using a ready-to-go disaster relief trailer and equipment that doesn’t need much but a little sharpening.

“They (NAMB) call on us quite frequently. We keep everything ready to go; we’ve just got to double check everything,” Patty said. This trip’s team — eight men from six Sand Mountain Association churches — plans to put in several days of hard work. “But we’re blessed by it,” Patty said.

And Mount Vernon residents indicate that they are, too, according to local newspapers. Mount Vernon Mayor David Keen said in an article in The Southern Illinoisan that the city would “be in dire straits” if not for the help of Baptist volunteers. “They have been a tremendous help to our citizens.”