Tornadoes in Arkansas

I have talked with Elders in Arkansas about the damage from the Tornadoes. They are going to get back intouch with me and let me know if we are needed there. If so I can change my plans and head that direction.

On Monday I will be heading to the West Coast of Florida for 2 plus months, I will be doing fund raising efforts. On Christmas Eve we delivered cloths and toys to the YWCA(battered wemans shelter)they have 25 kids living there with them. My wife has done this for the past 7 years. Also while we were in Nevada we took coats to a ladies shelter there.

Update from Yazoo City, MS (Tornadoes)

Yazoo County, Mississippi was struck by twin tornadoes this past Monday night (Nov. 29, 2010). We are still trying to rebuild from the E5 tornado that struck us April 24, 2010.

There are many one and two day repair projects to be accomplished as well as many major repair and total rebuilds. Just in this past Monday night's strike, we had 7 homes to receive major damage along with many that received some damage. There were 24 businesses in our downtown historical district that received damage as well as our courthouse and municipal buildings.

The Yazoo Humanitarian Recovery Long-Term Recovery Committee is in need of skilled teams (carpenters, electicians, plumbers, etc.) that can volunteer their time in our area to help restore those that can't restore their homes themselves. The Long-Term Recovery Committee is composed of individuals representing many of the churches in Yazoo City. The Long-Term Recovery Committee case manages each household affected and emphasizes our help to senior citizens, households with disabled family members, and households with young children. We are close to finishing three total rebuilds this month from last April's tornado strike. We are in need of purchasing several Katrina Cottages to place for housing. We are currently building additions onto already placed Katrina cottages to provide additional room for disabled individuals (we are building handicapped facilities in these additions) who were severly injured in last April's tornado strike.

If you can send skilled teams to help us, please contact the Yazoo Humanitarian Recovery. Our construction coordinator, Mr. Gerald Glascoe can be reached at the following numbers: cell (601) 720-4316 or home (662) 746-1780. He can give you a better overview of what we are dealing with and what tools and materials are needed.

Had a really good presentation about our mission work at Fairlawn Church of Christ here in Muncie yesterday.

I am working on fund raising events to start in January

Savage Storm Blasts Midwest

Schools here in Muncie, IN had the kids in storm shelters 3 times Tuesday.

One of the strongest storms in decades barreled across the Midwest on Tuesday.

Rice, Texas Tornado

Here is our new trailer donated by El Campo Church of Christ, El Campo, TX

Great day yesterday. Had two presentations one at AM services and another at PM services in North Central FL. Had one couple from each church talk to me about being part of the Disaster Assistance Mission and they each have an RV :):):)

Yesterday Don delivered meals and conducted 11 bible studies. Last night I attended Bellingrath Road CoC. This is a very nice small church. It is located right in front of the RV park that I talk about below. If another major disaster ever hits this area I think this church would work with us.

--Disaster Assistance--Bayou La Batre--Just got todays update from Don Hudson our Director of Evangelism. He had Bible Studies with 18 people today.

Lunches waiting for the last item to be added(a baked chicken sandwich)than they will be closed and boxed for Don and Rosemary to take out with them while they visit families and conduct bible studies in the Bayou La Batre area.

Chicken baking in our ovens

Disaster Assistance Making Plans for now and Future Storms

I am setup at the Payne's RV Park in Theodore, AL about 5 min from Bayou La Batre. This park is behind the Bellingrath Road Church of Christ. I can walk to Wednesday night service. Don and Rosemary are on their way here. Don will be conducting bible studies this week Rosemary and I will prepare meals for him to take out with him for
the families in Bayou La Batre.

I just had a meeting with the owner of this RV park. They were not effected by hurricane Katrina, so this would be a good place to setup if there was another major storm down here in this area. He said we could reserve 5 spots for our future needs. The park has laundry and bath house, on site propane fill up and he also owns an RV service center. Great for all our needs.

From here we could service Bayou La Batre, all of the towns on Mobile Bay and these towns in MS. Pascagoula, Moss Point, Gautier and Ocean Springs.

Great location to setup our Mobile Headquarters if we are needed in this area again.

Bayou La Batre, AL--Gulf Coast Oil Disaster

I will be heading back South on Tuesday or Wednesday. I have two meetings scheduled and I will be watching the tropical storms. The Bay Area Food Bank is no longer having food handouts at the Hemley Road Church of Christ, the handouts are now at the Bayou La Batre Comunity Center. So if we return there we will setup there or a different location other than the church.

Earl now a tropical storm

Well the East Coast dogged a big one. Earl left behind some flooding, wind damage and some power outages. Most areas say they will be open and in good shape for the Labor Day Weekend.

We still have no idea where the worst damage is going to be from Hurricane Earl. It may be Saturday before we know where we are needed.

Keeping an eye on Earl's path

Normally we would be on our way to the projected landfall area but this one is to hard to call. We are waiting longer to make sure we go to the correct area.

Watching Hurricane Earl

A satellite image shows Hurricane Earl spinning off the Florida coast Wednesday morning. As the storm barreled toward the eastern seaboard and threatened weekend holiday plans for beachgoers, North Carolina authorities ordered the mandatory evacuation of Ocracoke Island.

Hurricane Earl

We are watching the progress of this storm. The hurricane experts are now saying that it may take the same track as the Great Atlantic Hurricane of 1944. If it follows that track the damage will be Catastrophic. As soon as we know for sure we will be on our way there.

Spending this week at home catching up on paper work and watching the storms in the Atlantic. If a huricane hits the US than I will go there if not I will stay here until after Labor Day than head back to South Alabama.

Below is a normal week at Hemley Road Church of Christ, Bayou La Batre

Each week there is usually 2 grocery hand outs. The bay area food bank brings around 12000 pounds
one day and on Fridays they bring produce and fruits to hand out.
Also frozen dinners and water from CoC Disaster Relief is handed out.
Between 500 and 800 boxed lunches are delivered to nursing home and other needy families each day.
Cloths that are dropped off are sorted by size and handed out as needed.
Food from the Church pantry is handed out as needed also.
Volunteers are housed and taken care of almost every week.
Regular Church services are held on Sunday and Wednesday.
Many other things seem to come up each week also.

Yazoo City, MS Church of Christ

Got an update from Yazoo today. They have finished most of the clean up work and now are ready for the repairs and rebuilding of the houses. They now need specialized volunteers to help with that work. If you would like to help just let me know and I will give you the phone numbers to call. They have a building where they are housing the building supplies. disasterassistance@gmail.com

Great Day @ Hemley Road CoC in Bayou La Batre

Had my alarm set for 6AM today but was awaken by people arriving and lining up before it went off. The food hand out will not start until 10AM.

Today volunteers at Hemley Road CoC unloaded and sorted clothes by size. Also they delivered 600 boxed lunches.

Photos below are of parking lot, street and people standing in line today just to sign up for grocery give away Friday.

Also today Hemley Road CoC volunteers passed out around 700 boxed lunches.

Yesterday just as church was ending a truck from Compass Food Serv pulled in with around 1000 sandwich box lunches. Volunteers delivered them Sunday afternoon and today.

3 Were Baptised at Hemely Road CoC, Bayou La Batre Today

Very Good Crowd Today at Hemely Road CoC

Kids at Hemely Road CoC Having Breakfast Today

Today was another busy one here at Hemely Road Church of Christ. We passed out lots of produce and fruit form the food bank, sandwich boxes from Compass Food Serv and Hungry Man Dinners from Disaster Relief in Nashville. The photo below shows people lining up 2 plus hours before the food even arrives.

Wednesday my wife(Ty), Taya(9 years old) and I cooked and served 1120 lunches to the people here that were inline to pickup a box of groceries.

Below is ariticle about the group that was working here at the church last week

BAYOU LA BATRE, Alabama - The Partnership for Prescription Assistance will be in Bayou La Batre for three days beginning Wednesday, August 4, at the Hemley Road Church of Christ to help uninsured and financially-struggling Alabamians, including those affected by the Gulf of Mexico oil spill disaster, access information on programs that provide more than 2,500 brand name and generic prescription medicines for free or nearly free. The Partnership for Prescription Assistance (PPA) is a nationwide effort sponsored by America’s pharmaceutical research companies.

The South Alabama Regional Planning Commission – Area Agency on Aging will join the PPA at the event to help disabled adults or individuals 55 years of age or older identify other benefit programs that may be able to assist them via the Area Agency on Aging Benefits Check Up and Alabama SenioRx programs.

To date, the PPA has helped over 6.5 million patients find such programs, including more than 140,000 Alabamians. Since its launch in April 2005, the PPA has visited all 50 states and more than 2,500 cities to raise awareness about patient assistance programs.

Uninsured patients in need can access information on more than 475 patient assistance programs including nearly 200 offered by pharmaceutical companies. Patients can visit PPA’s easy-to-use Web site (www.pparx.org) or call the toll-free phone number (1-888-4PPA-NOW) where trained operators field calls in 150 languages. Disabled adults or individuals 55 years of age or older should also call toll-free at 1-800-243-5463 or log on the Web at www.BenefitsCheckUp.org/SARPC to determine other benefit programs that may be able to assist them.

Partnership for Prescription Assistance was here from 10AM to 3PM again today. Parking lot was full all day. About 4PM ref truck pulled up and dropped us off 250 boxed sandwich lunches(Compass Food Service). Than man from church in Daphne AL stopped and dropped off school supplies. Never a dull moment around here.

Another Busy Day

We went to food bank and picked up a load of groceries, Port City Church of Christ was here conducting a 1 day vacation bible school and Partnership for Prescription Assistance is setup helping people with their needs. They will be here for 3 days. Also 7 people from Americorps arrived last night and will be here for 10 weeks helping the food bank and the Hemley Road Church of Christ. Photo is of PPA helping the people. Also cooked 90 corndogs for the kids.

Our group of volunteers form El Campo Church of Christ left after church on Sunday so Monday I used to get caught up on thank you letters. Our next group of volunteers are scheduled to arrive today from Americorps.

Photo and Clip taken from today's Mobile Press-Register

The line is between our mobile headquarters and Hemely Rd Church of Christ.

People battle the heat as they wait to receive food during a Bay Area Food Bank distribution at Hemley Road Church of Christ Saturday July 31, 2010, in Bayou La Batre.

Sponsor a Lunch for Everyone

Saturday we had another big grocery handout from the food bank, it was sponsored by a company from Northern Alabama. They brought 20 of there employees to help with the distribution. As always we had people lining up at 6AM and we didn't open until 10AM. You should get your group together and sponsor a lunch for everyone. You can even come cook it and help hand it out if you like. Cost to sponsor a lunch for everyone is approx. $1700.00. Just let me know when you would like to do this.

Spiritual Growth Workshop Orlando

I was scheduled to have a booth space setup up there this weekend but thought the work we are doing here was much more important than standing around at a display booth.

Weekly Recap

Monday we had 180 people sign up for Saturdays food bank handout here at Hemely Road CoC. Don and Rosemary arrived and Don setup 10 Bible studies. Group of volunteers arrived from Texas to help for the week.

Tuesday Unloaded semi load of water one case at a time. Went to food bank to get supplies. Don had 27 people in Bible studies. We served 100 lunches.

Wednesday Food hand out at church(Bread, corn on the cob, frozen dinners)also signed up more people for Saturday count is now up to around 350. Don took out lunches and conducted Bible studies. Cooked 238 lunches.

Thursday Don took out lunches and had another 25 in Bible studies. Went to Sams to pickup supplies for Fridays lunches. Cook 114 lunches. 15 people from El Campo CoC arrived to help and hold vacation Bible School on Saturday

Friday Produce handout from the food bank and frozen dinners. Cooked and handed out 1075 lunches.

I have a church that can get me almost 1/2 off the warmer we need. The cost is now $1750.00 would be great if someone could help us get this.

We are very, very busy here. More people are coming each time we have a food or meal handout. BP still has not put the money in the account that was suppose to help people out.

Quote that was posted to one of my updates this week

Royce Ogle-I am so proud of you and the folks there for doing what you can to help the helpless. For some reason that is foreign to me, many people will get all excited about feeding people in some 3rd world country and not give a hoot about the hungry in their own back yard. Go figure.

More People Than Ever Today

We handed out bread, corn on the cob and frozen dinners. We also have around 330 families signed for the food bank giveaway that is here on Saturday. Cooked 238 lunches. Don took lunches out and had bible studies. Photo is of people in line 2 hours before we started.

Very busy day. Unloaded semi load of water one case at a time. Went to food bank to pickup truck load of bread for tomorrows giveaway. Cooked and handed out 100 lunches and Don had 27 people in his bible studies through out the day.

Today we signed up 180 people for Saturdays food give away. Don and Rosemary also arrived and Don has over 10 bible studies setup up for tomorrow.

"We Drive as Dawn".

Tomorrow morning early, Rosemary and I are leaving for Bayou La Batre to work with "Disaster Assistance" at the Hemly Rd. Church of Christ. We are helping this small church feed hundreds of meals each week to the people who have been so badly effected by the ...oil spill. My work will be to carry food to people's homes in the name of a Christian and to engage them in bible study and invite them to this church who is helping them. When we return, we will have a report for you. Thanks for your help and your prayers. Don

Tonight we have a group of 10-15 volunteers arriving from Church of Christ in Uvalde, TX. They will be here all week working.

Correction

The last two weeks I posted that we gave out over 1200 pounds of food on our big handout day it was 12,000 pounds I was short on zeros.

Today we only received about 1/4 Pallet of produce form the food bank, so we handed out 6 pallets of frozen dinners. Things here are most likely to get worse. BP has laid off everyone because of the storm and will most likely only hire a few of them back. People started lining up at 6:30 this morning and there was still people in line when we ran out of supplies.

Gulf Coast-South Alabama

Today was another very busy day we received around 1200 pounds of food to hand out. Below are the photos.

Unloading Truck

Standing in line waiting heat index today around 111

Getting food ready

Families getting their boxes filled with food

Update from Pikeville, KY Flood

Talked with Elder from Main Street Church of Christ yesterday and their members are doing a good job volunteering and taking care of the needs there. We will stay in touch.

Today we unloaded a semi filled with Hungry Man dinners(half chicken/half meatloft. Also BP is laying off most of the temp workers and most of them will not be hired back. This means that there will be more families needing help. You can help us just click on the donate button.

Well we had another good day today. There were 450 hot meals cooked and handed out along with a bag of food to everyone. Also we were still signing up people for Thursdays big handout, we reached the cutoff 200. Anyone after that will have to wait an see if there is anything left. I hate having a limit on how many people we can help but with only limited funds you can only do so much.

Gulf Coast

Today we gave everyone 3 bags of food, 1 case of frozen dinners and passed out over 400 hot meals. We had TV crews here from Ch 5 and 15 out of Mobile. Photos below are of people waiting in line and of volunteers getting bags and meals ready.

We have been in touch with the Main Street Church of Christ in Pikeville, Ky. They are having an Elders meeting and will get back with us on their needs. The church sectary said things are really bad and the roads are still closed.

Flash Flooding in Kentucky

Don Hudson our director of Evangelism is checking on what if anything is needed from us in this area.

Schedule For Next Few Days

Tonight - 15 people from a church in north Alabama will be arriving late

Monday - 9AM sign up for food bank handout Thursday
handout of food, supplies and more frozen dinners
500 hot to go meals prepared and ready to hand out at 2PM

Tuesday - 500 hot to go meals prepared and ready to handout at 2PM

Thursday - 10,000 pounds of food from food bank to be handed out

Friday - Produce from food bank handout and frozen dinners

Sometime this week a semi load (26,000)more frozen dinners will arrive

My wife(TY) came down here to help us for a few days. She was mowing a yard, stepped in a large hole and the result is torn ACL and must stay off it for 6 to 8 weeks.

The man in the middle wearing white shirt is Mr Roosevelt. He has been helping with whatever the church needs for the past 5 years. Some of you should remember him back after Katrina.

Unloading the produce truck

Produce unloaded ready to hand out

Gulf Coast Bayou La Batre--Last night our truck of frozen dinners arrived. The Jubilee Shrimp Co delivered them to us and are letting us keep 6 of the 8 palletts in their freezers.

Today we went to food bank and pickup 4 pickup truck loads of food and delivered 4 loads of furniture to a family who had no beds. We are also waiting for the truck with 8 pallets of frozen dinners to arrive. Tomorrow we will be handing out produce and the frozen dinners.

Wednesday we unloaded and handed out over 5000 pounds of food from the food bank. Also we cooked 1092 corndogs. After we were finished I took family down to Dauphin Island Beach to see what the oil spill was doing there. We could see some of the oil in the sand but didn't see any tarballs. The photo below shows how they are pilling up the sand along the beach to keep the waters from getting any further inland.

Waiting in line for todays food handout

Upcoming Schedule That I Know of so Far

Today food handout at Hemely Rd CoC
Tuesday meetings most of day and evening
Wednesday food bank handout at Hemely Rd CoC and cooking 500 meals
Thursday taking trailer to Gateway CoC in Pensacola to pickup food
Friday food bank produce handout at Hemely Rd CoC

Billy Helping Cook Breakfast Before Church

Breakfast Line Before Church

Church Service

Kids of Bayou La Batre

The below kids will also soon be needing school supplies. If you would like to help the information is on the right of this page.

Today was play day for the kids. They all save their change and keep it in a jar at the church and when there is enough they have a play day.

People of Bayou La Batre Standing in Line

I dont know about you but I dont like standing in line at Walmart in the cool building. These people here in Bayou La Batre are standing in line outside in the sun and heat. They stood in line this morning for a small bag of fruit and vegies. Than this afternoon they are standing in line to sign up for the handout next Wednesday because the food bank is only bring enough for 100 familes. So the first 100 who signs up today will get something next Wednesday. Hemely Road Church of Christ went to the food bank and bought groceries to give away on Monday. So the people will be standing line filling out paperwork that day also. How would you like to do your grocery shopping like that?????

On the tables below is all that arrived today from the food bank. We put 5 items in a bag and started handing them out. We soon ran out with people still waiting in line.

Photos below are from the food bank handout today. National Guard was on hand for help and crowd control

People linning up for lunch 1 hour before start time

Bayou La Batre, AL--Gulf Coast Oil Disaster

Kids from Bayou La Batre waiting in line for corndogs and chips before church. Tomorrow at 7:30 AM we go a few blocks to downtown and passout food donated by one of the major grocery chains. Friday fruit and vegies passed out here at the church form the food bank. Monday will be boxed, can goods and meat handout here at the church. If you can help us with a donation to purchase food and supplies that would be wonderful.