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About Spilyay tymoo. (Warm Springs, Or.) 1976-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 15, 2005)
Spilyty Ty moo, Wqi-m Springs, Oregon September 15, 2005 Page 16 X i, i . . -:;. Sacred Heart Suppah Camp Crew members, helping hurricane relief effort: Waylon Heath, Frank Sahme, Richard Tewee, Carol Lawrence. Sacred Heart Suppah, Curtis Stacona, Bobby Eagleheart, Timothy Kalama and Charles Kalama (from left). four bargain taction I ii w in I 717 S.W. 5th St Madras Or Just in at the Outpost! Socks for the family..... Leather Jackets bbraideredCaps Po 1 -Mew Shipment of- http:wvivi.theoutpoststort.com ninl.,,.,. , , ,., -- mttmt I . .t $3,295 ' llll (Kip Wsgxsftp & Aodfltp Sams Pholo COurtoy of Fut Mngmn 9 5 Ml .1 91 Ford Explorer 4x4 v Collins recounts experience working with victims of hurricane By Brian Mortensen Spilyiiy Tymoo While many of the people affected by Hurricane Katrina harbored complaints at those charged with rescu ing them, Nancy Collins met none of them, Collins, the sanitation manager for the Warm Springs Public Works De partment, was deployed to southern Mississippi as part of her duty as a commis sioned officer for the U.S. Public I Icalth Service Sept. 3. Collins said officers with the public health services are often deployed for "readiness for national emergencies." "They deploy based on a rotation basis, and my rota tion was up," she said. Collins has been with the Public I Icalth Service since August 1991, and this was the first time she had ever been de ployed. She received the call Thurs.,Sept. 1, when Katrina was threatening the Gulf Coast. She had originally been summoned to Mississippi the following clay but she was al lowed an extra day to prepare. When she called from a cell phone for a telephone in terview for this story, Collins was in Gulfport, Miss., part of an area on the Mississippi coastline she assisted that stretched west to Bay St. Louis, about one hour north of New Orleans. Collins said she did not go to New Orleans during her two-week stint in the south. A large part of her duty was assessing relief centers and making certain they were sanitary, "and making sure they were going the first couple of days," she said. She also swept through neighborhoods looking for people who may have been stranded and unable to get necessities like prescription refills. Collins described the hur ricane damage as "hit and miss," with some houses lev eled by the strong winds and others sustaining little or even no damage, even among neighboring houses. "I'm surprised," she said. "I thought it'd be all or noth ing." Instead, she said, "Like mm 9m mm S wim 94 Jccd Grand Cherokee 4x4 id r a tornado, it was hit-and-miss." The Mississippi coastline was hit with 30-foot waves that forced people on the shoreline to climb to the tops of their houses, just as on the news foot age of refugees in New Orleans. "When it hit, people went up to their attics, and that's how they survived," she said. When the high water was in the streets and enveloping the neighborhoods, some took to swimming between the houses if they had to. Collins described some people as rolling with the waves, scraping themselves on fences as the water leveled out, allow ing them to reach the next roof top when the waves crested. The attitude of the people she has encountered in the Gulfport-Hay St. Louis area was surprisingly friendly and even optimistic. Some of these in cluded people who had lost their houses in the storm, she said. "People have been very ap preciative," she said. "A lot of what you hear has not been very nice, but the people I've met here have been very nice. Ev erybody that we have talked to has thanked us for being here." She said, "I know people who lost everything. And they said it was God's way of pro viding them with a better place to live. People are surprisingly optimistic They started cleaning up, and if they didn't have anything to clean up, they were looking for place to move to." Some found refuge outside of the area, but would come back to clean up or repair their houses. "I saw people living in tents among the sticks and the rubble," she said. "Some people weren't leaving until the city tells them they have to," she said. "I saw people out mowing the lawn." Now almost two weeks after Katrina tread her dangerous path, communities in the Deep South are just getting their wa ter systems back online. Some systems may be otherwise func tional but are possibly contami nated by sewer leaks. Gulfport residents, in particular, were forced to use bottled water as recently as last week, Collins said. Collins is one of 34 environ PWIJCtL if . '' ..I- , -- f ,ml mental health officers sta tioned along the Mississippi coast. While she was there, news from New Orleans, and about the evacuation and un rest left behind, was scarce. She said local television sta tions weren't able to broad cast until Sunday, "although we know they're not making people evacuate anymore, and they're not pumping water out as fast as they thought they'd be able to," she said. Cell phone service has been serviceable in some places and not in others. On the coast, it had been func tioning, but has only recently been working in Gulfport, she said. The health officers were equipped, though, with satellite telephones and walkie-talkies. Out on the street, if people appear otherwise healthy, Collins said she's been handing out sunscreen, as temperamrcs are still in the 90s and humid there. She has also been handing out insect repellent and larvacide. Doctors are on hand at the relief centers, and a lot of people have complained of salt-water rashes, where the floodwater stayed in contact on their feet and legs. The national disaster man agement system proved to be just as overloaded to the resi dents in coastal Mississippi, as well. "One of the other prob lems is that FEMA (the Fed eral Emergency Management Agency) gives people a num ber to call or go on-line to make claims," she said. "Most people don't have cell phone service, and they certainly don't have computers. And when they have been able to call, they've gotten a voice mail message. It's been frus trating for people." Despite the eye-opening sights of houses literally lifted off their foundations and standing in the middle of the street, and boats blown onto the tops of vans, and the stress of caring for people whose lives have been shaken, Collins said she's fared well. "They make sure you have plenty of water and sun screen," she said. 5Hiip m $3,295