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EDITOR'S COMMENT:

Sherry Stultz, the facilitator of NHNE's "Forum for a Common Understanding"
<http://www.nhne.com/database/dbforum.html>, has been living in Ocean
Springs, Mississippi, at her parents house. Ocean Springs was one of the
hardest hit communities on the Gulf Coast. You can see where Ocean Springs
is located by visiting these maps:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9118848/

http://tinyurl.com/8pmt6

As one of the folks who wisely evacuated Ocean Springs before Katrina
struck, Sherry has been on the road with her daughter Astra, some friends,
and her faithful dog Abbey. What follows is her first report for NHNE.

--- David Sunfellow

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KATRINA UPDATE 1
By Sherry Stultz
Wednesday, August 31, 2005

My daughter and I left Sunday afternoon at 1:30 PM to evacuate. At first, I
thought we would just stay and weather the storm. On Saturday it was a
Category 3 and no one knew the exact landfall. I bought 18 liters of water,
some canned pineapples for Astra, and in the event of no caffeine for a few
days, I snagged a box of bottled ice coffee for myself. My friend Alexis
told me I could not stay in Ocean Springs for a Cat 4 and urged me to
evacuate with her family, so I made reservations at the same hotel in Panama
City, Florida for Monday morning. Saturday night I could not sleep, flicked
on the weather channel, saw Katrina was a Cat 4 and knew I was leaving in
the morning. I called the hotel and asked for an extra day and started doing
laundry. Alexis had decided the same and we made plans to leave together.

My parents were visiting my brother in Texas at the time and a list was
emailed to me of essentials to take -- the fire proof box, the photo albums,
baby books and their medications. I packed clothes for Astra and me, dropped
my mother's dog off with my Aunt Genice, north of I-10 near the community of
Latimer, and finished loading my car, including my 12 year old dog Abbey who
has four weeks before her cancer completely consumes her. I was frazzled
upon leaving Ocean Springs, because by that time I knew we were getting a
direct hit and that folks had become complacent from so many near-misses in
the last few years that they were not taking this storm seriously. I emailed
David and told him people were going to die. How sick I am to know I was
right, but then I never imagined the number would be so high. I met the
Kublers and we began our journey from Gautier, Mississippi to Panama City. A
normal time frame for this trip is three hours. It took us nine hours and we
rarely stopped for anything. Highway 90 and I-10 west were packed. No one
had thought to issue an order for contra-flow for this interstate like they
did for the others and we crawled through Mobile, Alabama at a snail's pace.

Astra's dad, Vince, decided to stay. I had no control over this and wished
he had not been so reckless, but as it stands he has been our only source of
communication. People can only text message into and out of Mississippi.
Cell phones do not work otherwise.

Panama City was a sight for sore eyes, but then our hotel was filthy, with
cockroaches in the room, feces on the walls in the bathroom and blood
splattered above the bed and reeked of smoke. So much for travelocity.
Alexis, her husband Mike, and son Nick were a few doors down and the place
was filled with surly looking folks. My old girl Abbey slept at my feet with
her ears perked all night long. She is one for the record books, trying to
protect even as she leaves us. The next morning as the storm made land fall
we desperately looked for other accommodations, but found everything full.

A friend of Alexis and Mike's met us at the IHOP and offered her home to us.
We have been here for the last two nights. She and her husband Jay have a
new baby boy named Cameron and were kind enough to let us camp out with our
children and pets. We have watched CNN and FOX news, glued to the TV just
like were after 9/11, only this time it's our homes and our families.

News arrived yesterday from Astra's dad in the form of a text message: Mike
and Alexis's home was still there, some damage, but not mostly intact. Later
that day he made his way to my parent's home in Ocean Springs where the
damage was much more severe than in Gautier. I heard the beep on my phone
and eagerly read the text: "2705 n car are ok. Trees down and cover back
garage." Obviously the water damage is hard to assess, since he could not
get inside the house.

The rest of the area had mixed damage according to Vince. He could not make
it to East Beach, but when he finally did all the beautiful homes just 8/10
of a mile from where my parents live have been leveled to the slab.

I am still trying to find my friend's sister and her mother. For now, I will
not use their names, but I may need some help later locating them. We have
had no news from them and they stayed in downtown Ocean Springs during
Katrina.

In a few hours I am leaving for Macon, Georgia to stay with my friend
Dianne. She has opened her home to me and Astra for the time being. We do
not know when Ocean Springs will be habitable again, given the destruction
and loss of strategic bridges into and out of the area. I cried most of
yesterday when the first pictures emerged. I know damage of this scale is
nearly impossible to rebuild and I grieve for all the people who live on the
Mississippi Gulf Coast -- our lives are forever changed and our homes are
gone and some people may never return. Jobs are gone that will not be
replaced for months or years. My job is gone, too. It was only a part-time
job, but it gave me enough to get by while I was in graduate school. I am
simply one of many now.

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Published by David Sunfellow
NewHeavenNewEarth (NHNE)
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