Restoring Hope in the Aftermath of Hurricane Katrina

In keeping with our company’s belief in reaching out into the community to help those less fortunate, Coastland continues to assist the people of Mississippi through “hands-on” effort.   In February of 2006, 11 Coastland employees arrived in Biloxi, Mississippi to help the re-building efforts. The opportunity to witness the slow but meaningful rebuilding progress compelled Coastland to take part in another outreach trip which took place in April of 2007.   The goal of these trips is to make a direct physical difference in the lives of the Hurricane Katrina victims.  As charitable organizations, outreach groups and other businesses commit to helping the victims of the Hurricane, a physical change is finally being made in the lives of the people of Biloxi.

The overall mission of these outreach trips is to touch as many lives as possible through the rebuilding of homes in the Biloxi area.  Targeted homes belong to those families who are incapable of restoring their own homes.  Families include the disabled, the elderly and single mothers.  Assignments have included re-roofing, removing contaminated/moldy material and completely rebuilding interiors of homes (including electrical, plumbing, sheetrock, carpentry, insulation, installation of cabinets and other related fixtures).

Over the last few years, the work of countless volunteers has allowed numerous families to move out of their FEMA-supplied trailers and move into secure, weatherproof homes. The opportunity to meet these families has provided our team with inexpressible joy.  Being able to see the appreciation on the faces of families and being showered with thanks provides an intangible benefit to the lives of the volunteers.  Discussions with the families enables us to better grasp the devastating reality of what it was like to live through the hurricane and to experience losing everything.  Stories of devastation, emotional stress and loss of hope will never be forgotten.  Nor will accounts of gratitude for the renewal of hope be forgotten.  Because of what the volunteering teams have accomplished over the last few years, these families will be able to get their lives back on track.

Our first trip to Biloxi occurred only five months after the traumatizing Hurricane Katrina swept across three Gulf Coast states.  In February of 2006, we witnessed areas of total destruction and wondered how this area would ever get back on its feet again.  Unthinkable masses of wreckage had replaced areas where shopping centers, houses and hotels had once rested.  Homes were physically lifted off of their foundations and moved blocks away.  Hotels and casinos that were on barges at the shoreline were lifted and slammed two to three blocks inland.  The bottom two floors of nearly every building within blocks of the shoreline were simply gone.  Numerous trees were either uprooted entirely or snapped about 20 feet off the ground.  Water lines from the tidal surge from the hurricane were anywhere from 9 to 28 feet deep, covering literally square miles of homes and businesses.  Many of the homes that were not completely demolished from the water and winds have been abandoned and bulldozed – sometimes leaving only a staircase from what used to be the front steps and leading to a vacant lot.  Soon our group realized that we were only looking at one part of one city.  This magnitude of disaster spanned for hundreds of miles – something well beyond our comprehension. 

On our second trip to Biloxi, we witnessed a transformation.  As efforts continue around the nation to assist victims of Hurricane Katrina, a difference is being made.  Although it sometime seems insignificant, the work of the volunteers makes a difference – one family at a time.  Even though these efforts are slowly making a difference in the lives of the Katrina victims, the rebuilding process is nearly insurmountable and will undoubtedly last for almost a decade.  For many, the adrenaline of the crisis has subsided and frustration is settling in.  Many families have come to the end of their allotted time in FEMA trailers; yet, work on many of their homes has not even begun.  Thousands of people still live in these compact trailers, hoping to move into their homes soon.  With the help of volunteers, these families’ hopes can become a reality.

Coastland’s hope is that others will use their resources to provide assistance (whether it be physical “hands-on” or financial) to the countless non-profit organizations assisting in the rebuilding the Gulf Coast.  The Katrina victims will not be forgotten or forsaken.  Hope can (and is) being restored.  One thing is for sure – these trips have changed the lives of Coastland employees.  Let the people of Mississippi know that we will be back.

For information on the international relief organization that coordinated the rebuilding efforts, go to http://www.hopeforce.org  

To view a slideshow of images from the February 2006 Hurricane Katrina Relief trip, click here.