RICHMOND — Baptists in the Mid-Atlantic are preparing for the onslaught of “Frankenstorm,” as Hurricane Sandy barrels north from the Caribbean, a wintry storm moves in from the west and frigid air flows south from Canada — a dangerous hybrid that could converge on much the East Coast early next week.
Disaster relief teams in the District of Columbia, North Carolina and Virginia are on standby, while meeting organizers in the region are evaluating contingency plans if severe weather forces cancellations.
Officials of the D.C. Baptist Convention, which is scheduled to hold its annual meeting Oct. 29-30 at Clifton Park Baptist Church in Silver Spring, Md., are tracking the storm, said associate executive director Robert Cochran.
The Virginia Baptist Mission Board’s disaster relief units, which are likely to see action next week, recently received new weather resistant “wraps.”
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“We’re monitoring the situation in light of the potential impact,” Cochran said. “If we’re hit and significant outages and flooding occur, we’ll have to postpone.” At this point the meeting is still scheduled, he said.
Meanwhile, the Portsmouth Baptist Association in Virginia’s Tidewater region has postponed its Oct. 28 annual fall meeting. “We are in the process of contacting program personnel regarding suitability” of another date, associational missionary John Carpenter said in an email to the association’s 32 affiliated congregations.
Officers of another group, the 50-church Peninsula Baptist Association in Newport News, Va., whose fall meeting is set for Oct. 29-30, said in an email they “are monitoring the weather for Monday and Tuesday and will make a decision by Monday morning if we feel the need to cancel some or all” of it.
The Virginia Baptist Mission Board’s disaster relief ministry has contacted its relief network, said coordinator Dean Miller.
“We’re asking associational leaders to put feeding and recovery units on alert,” said Miller. “We’re having lots of conversations with our partners to the north, just to clarify assets and determine how we respond together. We anticipate that Virginia Baptists will be responding in some way, whether that’s in Virginia or in the states to the north of us.”
He added that the earliest units might be deployed would likely be next Tuesday or Wednesday.
The D.C. convention also is ready to deploy its recently-formed emergency response team, said Cochran. Ricky Creech, the convention’s executive director, has alerted team members and is in contact with both Baptist and federal disaster relief officials, Cochran added.
The emergency response team was organized earlier this year, purchased two trailers and other supplies, and launched a series of training events for volunteers. It works closely with D.C. Homeland Security, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the American Red Cross and other agencies, including the Virginia Baptist Mission Board.
A spokesperson for North Carolina Baptist Men said its disaster relief units also are on alert. The Cooperative Baptist Fellowship of North Carolina is not a first responder in disaster events, but it encourages churches to work through North Carolina Baptist Men, said executive coordinator Larry Hovis.
The Cooperative Baptist Fellowship of Virginia also is not a first responder, but it offers its community mission trailer to churches which are engaged in recovery and assistance efforts, said field coordinator Rob Fox.
Cameron Edgar, moderator of the Mid-Atlantic Cooperative Baptist Fellowship — which includes both Maryland and D.C. — said churches there are monitoring the storm. Edgar, pastor of College Parkway Baptist Church in Arnold, Md., said he had not yet heard of cancellations in the area.
Robert Dilday (rdilday@religiousherald.org) is managing editor of the Religious Herald.