After a week in the office, I needed to visit the Coast and affirm all I had heard. Somehow my head demanded a connection between the auditory and visual parts of my brain. Saturday morning I drove off towards Mississippi's Gulf Coast.

I had seen the evidence of Katrina's powerful winds where I was staying in Meridian, 150 miles away from most of the destruction. The obvious damage had been cleaned up in Meridian. There were still plenty of tree stumps to be seen, but the three months since Katrina passed through, had been enough time for completion of much of the cleanup.

However, as I drove south I noticed that there was an increase in the number of damaged trees by the side of the freeway. It seemed as if the winds had roared down the open spaces of the freeway, knocking down about 20 to 30 feet of trees on either side of the roadway for miles and miles and miles. North of the Coast, one hundred or more miles, many of the fallen trees had been removed, but as I went south more and more of the broken trees were left standing. The same applied to houses. The most obvious sign of damage were blue roofs. Blue roofs are plastic tarps attached over a roof damaged and leaking water, as a temporary measure to prevent further leaks. The further south I went the more blue roofs there were.

I ducked off the freeway about 30 miles from the Coast and the damage to buildings was immediately obvious. There were piles of debris by the road everywhere and blue roofs on probably 80% of the homes. At this point I had not yet realized how much a home was damaged by the loss of its roof shingles. Shingles are all that keeps the water away from destroying a home and the owner's possessions in leakage through the ceiling. After driving and seeing piles of trash …. no ….. I mean people's belongings …. by the road, it struck me that this was where the real loss had come in. These piles of what looked like ordinary trash were all water damaged personal items. ….. books, paper, food, clothes, pictures, furniture, refrigerators, washers, dryers, toasters, blenders, stereos, computers and on and on ….. all lost to water damage, and all piles by the road waiting for FEMA trucks to bury it in a dump.
More miles down the road and closer to the Coast I began to see even more damage to buildings. No longer was it a roof. Now walls, windows, doors …. whole roofs blown away ….. missing. When I crossed over Route 10 I noticed a freeway light blown down. It seemed to signal the beginning of the real destruction.

I found myself on the main commercial road in Waveland. It was a four lane divided highway and reminded me of several roads in the Detroit area, like Woodward Ave. This was where the level of destruction really hit me. It wasn't just the homes that were damaged, every business was destroyed by the wind, rain and waves. I had been hearing all week about how the people trying to live here had nothing ….. no supplies …. And now I understood why …. All the businesses that sold “stuff” were gone. Even if someone wanted toilet paper the stores selling it had vanished. AND this was over three months later. Some of the stores were trying to cleanup. It was obvious that stores like Kmart were in the process of rebuilding. I would say over 99% of the commercial stores were gone. As I drove around I came to realize that the stores which were open reflected BIG companies that had the financial resources to spend huge dollars on the cost of a quick rebuild. Stores like WalMart Home Depot, Lowe's, 84 Lumber …… these were all open. After all there was money to be made in selling building supplies. Parking lots in these stores were overflowing. From what I heard and saw, lines at checkout were incredibly long, with basic supplies selling out as soon as they were delivered.

The tragedy was not only in the physical loss of the business. Jobs were gone. Every store that I saw empty represented multiple lost jobs…… jobs that were not coming back anytime soon. Another loss to the business was in the hours and years of work it took to build each of those businesses in a viable functioning store. This is one aspect of a business that few realize. It takes hours of work, anxiety, stress to start and build up a business. When a business is destroyed and lost, restarting the business means going through all that again. That single fact will keep many owners from reopening their stores.

After exploring the main commercial area, I decided to head for the residential ocean front area in Waveland. Things quickly got bad, but it wasn't until I crossed over the infamous railroad tracks that I truly understood the meaning of “devastation”. Instead of doors and windows and roofs missing, the entire structure was leveled. It wasn't just one house, it was almost all houses. It was as if a bulldozer had repeatedly run over most of the homes, those left standing were missing roofs, windows, and soaked like a sponge. It was obvious that just after the storm roads were impassable from the Katrina blown debris that covered them. Now the main roads had been cleared and the side streets partially passable as bulldozers had just pushed debris off the road. It was a miracle I didn't get a flat tire driving around.


I find what I saw almost impossible to describe. I am not sure the attached pictures even give a true impression. Everywhere I turned I saw shirts, and blankets, pants, socks, underwear, curtains all hanging off trees branches. Stuff was scattered everywhere. I remembered watching TV after the storm and wondering why homeowners didn't look around for their stuff. Now I understood why. Their belongings, were mixed in with their neighbors possessions and blown across a mile of broken boards, insulation, wiring, glass, the pieces of their house. Their possessions were just gone. It would be a miracle to find an item a resident recognized as “theirs”.

I drove through the debris and stumbled upon Waveland United Methodist Church. There were cars and people out front so I stopped. The team at the church was from the state of Washington. There were about 18 people who had flown in to work for over a week rebuilding the church. They had cleaned and deconstructed, rewired, dry walled and completed numerous other tasks during their time in Waveland. They were so proud of their accomplishments. I realized they were just one of thousands of people, who like me, had volunteered and worked to make things better for the people suffering from Katrina. They were also not the last. There would be ten's of thousands more people volunteering in the coming months and years.
Seeing Waveland put it all in perspective for me. I could not believe how blessed I was. I could not believe how great the suffering of Gulf Coast residents was.

I continued my journey along the Coast, seeing and talking to people. There is little more I can say except that the scene in Waveland was repeated in each community along the Coast. By the time I was back in Meridian I was a different person.

I guess the final visual to consider is this. The next time you are driving from your home to the main commercial area in your town imagine that every house and business you see is a collapsed building, or missing windows, doors, roof. …… that is what it is like along the Mississippi Gulf Coast in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Let us not forget.

Most of this discussion has been about the destruction of Katrina, yet there is one more segment of the story that must be told. After Katrina swept through the South life changed for the people living here. Some people moved in with relatives and friends. Others moved to shelters in neighboring States. Many choose to stay behind and try to rebuild. The Red Cross and other organizations provided emergency care for these people at first. When I arrived in December the emergency response agencies were beginning to pull out. FEMA had stepped in to fill the gap, providing some funding and shelter for the residents of the Coast. My feeling before coming to Mississippi was that FEMA was largely meeting the needs of these residents. By the end of my trip to the Coast, I understood that FEMA had met only some of the needs of these citizens. FEMA was providing most of the food needs. Shelter was provided in a variety of ways. FEMA shelters were common at first on a very limited short term basis. Next FEMA moved families to FEMA trailers. I thought these trailers were adequate, until I lived in one for two weeks and saw the FEMA Parks created to house the thousands of trailers. The pictures I have added here offer a pretty good view of what FEMA has done. The trailers are approximately 8' X 30'. They of course come with a built bed, mattress, couch, table, chairs, stove, refrigerator, microwave, toilet and shower, but that is it. There are no plates, spoons, cups, toilet paper, towels, soap, appliances ….. none of the basic necessities are provided. There is also nowhere to buy these items (except Wal Mart to some degree). There are a limited supply of jobs to provide an income, and even with money, there is nowhere to spend it. The FEMA Parks are packed with trailers, parked on a rough gravel surface. There are no playgrounds for kids to play or citizens to gather. These residents seem to have no future. They can with handouts of generous churches and other relief organizations survive day to day. The reconstruction is going to come very slowly. Much of the infrastructure must be rebuilt, before people can begin to enjoy a life we consider normal. Beyond that there is almost nothing that is provided.

Living requires HOPE. This seems to be what FEMA has forgotten …. to provide hope to people. This same problem was faced after the great depression. What worked in the 30's should work equally well now. There is so much to do that FEMA should be providing work for people. From child care to cleanup to reconstruction, there is so much to do and so many ways that people can help rebuild their own lives. FEMA needs to be the catalyst to a better life.