RICHMOND—Baptist disaster relief organizations in the Mid-Atlantic were poised to respond Aug. 29 as flooding from Hurricane Isaac inundated wide sections of every Gulf Coast state.
Relief organizers in Virginia, North Carolina and the District of Columbia said no teams of volunteers had yet been mobilized, but added they were keeping in close touch with national disaster relief groups.
A satellite image Aug. 28 shows Isaac's impact on the Gulf Coast.
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Hurricane Isaac made landfall on Louisiana’s coast Aug. 28 and had weakened to a tropical storm by the next afternoon as it moved inland. But officials warned of continued life-threatening hazards from storm surges and local flooding. More than 800,000 people were without power in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Texas and Arkansas, and power companies said customers should expect extended outages.
“We continue to monitor the situation with Hurricane Isaac,” said Dean Miller, disaster relief coordinator for the Virginia Baptist Mission Board in a Facebook post. “It appears that Plaquemines Parish [La.] has been hardest hit at this time. Virginia Baptists have been in relationship with Plaquemines Parish since Hurricane Katrina [in 2005] and, if called upon, will send assistance.”
Gaylon Moss, disaster relief coordinator for North Carolina Baptist Men, said Aug. 29 his agency is “basically in a hold pattern for right now.”
“We have three task forces on standby to assist if needed,” Moss said in an email. “This includes kitchen, recovery units, shower/laundry units and the necessary teams to support them.”
The District of Columbia Baptist Convention’s recently-formed emergency response team also was “ready to deploy,” said Ricky Creech, the convention’s executive director.
“Our chainsaw, debris removal and flood response units are on standby,” Creech said in an email.
Robert Dilday ([email protected]) is managing editor of the Religious Herald.