freemanruss
ArboristSite Lurker
I first want to say that until Katrina, I had never chased a storm. On Sept5 2005, the company I worked for Action Tree rervice in Warren, Nj bought me a plane ticket to Jackson, Mississippi. From there I took A bus to Meridian, MS. I wasn't allowed to bring a chainsaw on the plane, so I just loaded my saddle, a large block, some climbing lines, a 5/8" rigging line, helmet, etc...into a vietnam era military sea bag along with a water purifier, some clothes and a hammock.
My intent was to volunteer my services for 1 week, give something back, you know? I had no lodging, a little cash and no food. Furthermore, I hadn't coordinated hooking up with any organizations, but found one as soon as I got there.
I went to the North Carolina Baptist Men, they put me up and put me to work. I had an army of seventy year old men and women carrying brush and wood to the curb, for free!!! I met some amazing people, I stayed for 2 weeks my life is forever changed.
When I went back to Jersey, back to pruning trees for rich folks who were completely oblivious to the plight of the peoples of Mississippi, I was annoyed that I wasn't cutting trees off of houses. In December when things in Jersey got slow for lack of frost, I asked to be laid off so that I could return to Mississippi, only this time, I would drive down with appropriate saws and more rope. I loaded my 1988 Honda Accord with An 020T, an 066 some fatter rope, more blocks and an 8to1. I took a tent this time, and my dog, Alice. We left Jersey at 10am Christmas eve and got to Gulfport, Mississippi just after dark on the 28th. I spent Christmas with some folks in North Carolina, we had roast leg of venison....wow.
I got to work right away, finishing the work the volunteers couldn't get, stuff I knew people would've had to pay big money for, big trees, multiple busted tree jams on roofs, huge hangers balanced on limbs over cars...you know, storm damage. After a few weeks, with the help of student volunteers from KAnsas and Wisconsin, we had worked through everything that I could get without a crane. By this time, I had sought out more work, soliciting other relief organizations, Lutheran Disaster reponse, Salvation Army, a few others that I don't recall. My biggest frustration was having to retrain a new volunteer every week to run ropes when rigging limbs from storm compromised trees. It was also frustrating to see FEMA contracted ROE companies with bucket trucks and bobcats, and no qualified personnell destroy lawns unneccessarily digging up wide rooted pine stumps while the bucket operator wasted enormous amounts of time fine pruning another pine with a 12' power pole saw. I, on the other hand, could've used the same truck and with 1 set, removed 4 nasty snapped off pines over a house across the street, two others in the neighbor's yard and pruned alarge snapped off limb over yet another house. Instead I had to manually climb and remove the above listed trees with spikes and a saddle.
I found an organization in Biloxi, Mississippi called Hands on USA. They had a large core of long term volunteers and a small John DEERE 250 skidsteer. I pitched my tent in the back of church lot with a hundred or so other volunteers from all walks of life, and there I stayed and worked, removing storm damaged trees from people's houses and yards so they could be elgible for free roofs so that their sea ravaged houses and memories could possily be salvaged, with my dog, until the end of April.
At one point, I think it was the end of January, I was approched by demolition company rep and comissioned to remove stainless steel sinks and counters, shelving units pots pans and other miscellaneous kitchen accoutrements using a zip line I rigged up from the top of a listing casino barge to be donated to local soup kitchens in the area.
The first day took some 2-3 hours of setup, luckily I had the help of four Lockheed-Martin engineers to help me work through the bugs. They were down from Virginia for like 4 days, flew in, flew out. In five hours of funtional and constantly evolving operation, we had sent 100 tables and many chairs down to the concrete below, over wrecked steel and water 120 or so feet from top to bottom. We kept the line up for a couple of weeks and worked, with a team of 10-30 volunteers bringing items to zip down on the friction controlled zipline. We got a lot of stuff, and lost nothing off our line. We did, however, choose to throw a few items down onto the steel below, just for fun.
I was eventually evicted from my apartment in JERSEY, my car broke down and had to be left there and my dog started nipping people when they tried to pet her. I hooked up a ride back to Jersey on Craig'slist with a guy driving to Vermont, who incidentally was also a volunteer. I am now in New York state getting regrouped, and when the big storm comes, I'll be ready to have at her again. Not that I would change a minute, but I think things would've been easier if I had gone to the less affected areas and tried to put a few dollars in my pocket. It would be nice to have contacts for work opportunities after future storms a few days or a week of paid work here and there. [email protected]
My intent was to volunteer my services for 1 week, give something back, you know? I had no lodging, a little cash and no food. Furthermore, I hadn't coordinated hooking up with any organizations, but found one as soon as I got there.
I went to the North Carolina Baptist Men, they put me up and put me to work. I had an army of seventy year old men and women carrying brush and wood to the curb, for free!!! I met some amazing people, I stayed for 2 weeks my life is forever changed.
When I went back to Jersey, back to pruning trees for rich folks who were completely oblivious to the plight of the peoples of Mississippi, I was annoyed that I wasn't cutting trees off of houses. In December when things in Jersey got slow for lack of frost, I asked to be laid off so that I could return to Mississippi, only this time, I would drive down with appropriate saws and more rope. I loaded my 1988 Honda Accord with An 020T, an 066 some fatter rope, more blocks and an 8to1. I took a tent this time, and my dog, Alice. We left Jersey at 10am Christmas eve and got to Gulfport, Mississippi just after dark on the 28th. I spent Christmas with some folks in North Carolina, we had roast leg of venison....wow.
I got to work right away, finishing the work the volunteers couldn't get, stuff I knew people would've had to pay big money for, big trees, multiple busted tree jams on roofs, huge hangers balanced on limbs over cars...you know, storm damage. After a few weeks, with the help of student volunteers from KAnsas and Wisconsin, we had worked through everything that I could get without a crane. By this time, I had sought out more work, soliciting other relief organizations, Lutheran Disaster reponse, Salvation Army, a few others that I don't recall. My biggest frustration was having to retrain a new volunteer every week to run ropes when rigging limbs from storm compromised trees. It was also frustrating to see FEMA contracted ROE companies with bucket trucks and bobcats, and no qualified personnell destroy lawns unneccessarily digging up wide rooted pine stumps while the bucket operator wasted enormous amounts of time fine pruning another pine with a 12' power pole saw. I, on the other hand, could've used the same truck and with 1 set, removed 4 nasty snapped off pines over a house across the street, two others in the neighbor's yard and pruned alarge snapped off limb over yet another house. Instead I had to manually climb and remove the above listed trees with spikes and a saddle.
I found an organization in Biloxi, Mississippi called Hands on USA. They had a large core of long term volunteers and a small John DEERE 250 skidsteer. I pitched my tent in the back of church lot with a hundred or so other volunteers from all walks of life, and there I stayed and worked, removing storm damaged trees from people's houses and yards so they could be elgible for free roofs so that their sea ravaged houses and memories could possily be salvaged, with my dog, until the end of April.
At one point, I think it was the end of January, I was approched by demolition company rep and comissioned to remove stainless steel sinks and counters, shelving units pots pans and other miscellaneous kitchen accoutrements using a zip line I rigged up from the top of a listing casino barge to be donated to local soup kitchens in the area.
The first day took some 2-3 hours of setup, luckily I had the help of four Lockheed-Martin engineers to help me work through the bugs. They were down from Virginia for like 4 days, flew in, flew out. In five hours of funtional and constantly evolving operation, we had sent 100 tables and many chairs down to the concrete below, over wrecked steel and water 120 or so feet from top to bottom. We kept the line up for a couple of weeks and worked, with a team of 10-30 volunteers bringing items to zip down on the friction controlled zipline. We got a lot of stuff, and lost nothing off our line. We did, however, choose to throw a few items down onto the steel below, just for fun.
I was eventually evicted from my apartment in JERSEY, my car broke down and had to be left there and my dog started nipping people when they tried to pet her. I hooked up a ride back to Jersey on Craig'slist with a guy driving to Vermont, who incidentally was also a volunteer. I am now in New York state getting regrouped, and when the big storm comes, I'll be ready to have at her again. Not that I would change a minute, but I think things would've been easier if I had gone to the less affected areas and tried to put a few dollars in my pocket. It would be nice to have contacts for work opportunities after future storms a few days or a week of paid work here and there. [email protected]
