Hurricanes push Alabama disaster relief volunteers, others to limits

As Southern Baptists launch the fourth disaster relief response to Florida, Alabama Baptists are taking a noticeably smaller part than usual.
   
Tommy Puckett, director of disaster relief for the Alabama Baptist State Board of Missions, said one communications unit was activated but was recalled before reaching Florida. “That’s all we’ve been asked to do,” he said, “and I don’t know that we’ll be asked to do any more. We’ve got too much going on in our state.”
   
Puckett said because of the needs still remaining from Hurricane Ivan’s rampage in south Alabama, the North American Mission Board (NAMB) has not asked Alabama for the usual high response the state gives.
   
“[The disaster relief teams] are hanging in there,” Puckett said. “We’ve just used them longer than we’ve ever used them over a consistent period of time.”
   
From the time that Hurricane Charley hit southeastern and central Florida, and on through Hurricanes Frances and Ivan, Alabama disaster relief teams have been meeting needs in the affected areas.
   
To ask teams to respond to Jeanne would be hard, Puckett said. “You’re just running out of teams and you don’t know where to go to get any more.”
   
He said all the feeding sites in response to Ivan were to close down by Oct. 2, but the cleanup and recovery teams from Alabama and other states were still in the area.
   
Puckett said there was a possibility some of these crews could go home, regroup and then go down to Florida or back to south Alabama, depending on the needs. When asked how long  regrouping could take, Puckett said, “I can’t answer that. That’s a question we’ve never had to face before.
   
“This is the first time we’ve had to face this many missions so close together,” he said.
   
Alabama is not alone in its predicament. Responses to Ivan are continuing in West Virginia and North Carolina. So far, crews from 24 state conventions plus NAMB have responded to the four hurricanes, and Southern Baptists have given nearly $400,000 to NAMB to help cover costs.
   
At least six people were killed as a result of Hurricane Jeanne, which slammed ashore just before midnight Sept. 25 with 120-mph winds near the southern end of Hutchinson Island, five miles southeast of Stuart on Florida’s east coast — near the site of Hurricane Frances’ landfall on Sept. 5.
   
Jeanne has compounded the damage in many of the same areas of Florida hit by Frances and even Charley in the middle of the state, according to Mickey Caison, manager of the NAMB’s disaster operations center.
   
Caison said Sept. 27 marked day 50 of the response to the hurricanes. At that time, about 600 Southern Baptist disaster relief volunteers from 10 states were in various stages of deployment to Florida. “We have mobilized and de-mobilized nearly 500 units as a part of the response we have been in for 50 days now,” Caison said. “We have used just about every one of our units that is available, or that we can get to Florida, and we’ve used them two or three times.”
   
He said many of the mobile kitchens, shower units, communication units and cleanup and recovery teams that responded after Hurricane Ivan’s landfall Sept. 16 in south Alabama would be reassigned to the areas hardest hit by Hurricane Jeanne from West Palm Beach, Fla., as far north as Daytona as well as from Orlando to Tampa.
   
According to the National Hurricane Center, four hurricanes haven’t battered the same state in one season since 1886 in Texas. Since Aug. 13, nearly 100 people in the United States have been killed in hurricanes and tropical storms and damage estimates exceed $15 billion.
   
“It’s stretching us and challenging us,” Caison said. “For those who have been affected by it, you can’t imagine the impact that it has on them.”
   
Hurricane Jeanne also left wreckage in the Caribbean as it went through as a tropical storm. Although weaker in strength than her future hurricane status, Tropical Storm Jeanne’s heavy rains and storm surges caused devastating flash flooding in Haiti.
   
According to the Associated Press, Haitian officials have placed the storm’s death toll at more than 1,500, with an additional 300,000 left homeless.
   
Relief efforts are focused on the city of Gonaives, which was the hardest hit. Currently, World Vision representatives are there, distributing aid.
   
The Cooperative Baptist Fellowship (CBF) has given $10,000 and the American Baptist World Relief Office has given $5,000, both to World Vision to aid in its efforts in Haiti.
   
Meanwhile, Caison said, IMB, the Virginia Baptist Mission Board (VBMB) and the Florida Baptist Convention are preparing to send units and teams to the Caribbean, including Haiti, Grenada, Jamaica and the Bahamas.
   
CBF is also partnering with VBMB to send relief volunteers to the Bahamas, Grenada and Jamaica. (TAB, wire services)