Our County Is Now a Literal Disaster Area

[apl68]

We had a storm on Sunday morning that blacked out our entire town.  I was visiting family elsewhere in the state when it happened.  Where I was we had the most violent thunderstorm that any of us could recall.  It banged and flashed for literally hours on end.  We lost power where I was staying for some hours.  But the outages didn't seem widespread, there was little evidence of storm damage when we went to church, and power was restored by late afternoon.  It looked like the storm had more bark than bite.  I didn't seen any damage on the two-hour drive home.

Then I got home and saw the whole town blacked out.  Next morning I scouted around by foot and bicycle.  We had multiple streets blocked and lines down due to fallen trees.  Our pastor told me about when the power had gone out.  Another church member said that he had heard that we might not have power restored for some days.  I saw some of Main Street back up and running by late morning. 

My house had power restored some time after five.  Since our block has a history of being one of the last places to have power restored after previous outages, I figured that things were getting back to normal.  A final bicycle round before dark indicated that this was not the case.  Our block seemed to be one of the few places that did have power.  There were generators rattling away everywhere else.  Our library was also still blacked out.

[apl68]

Yesterday morning, I met our assistant director at the library.  It was still blacked out.  She had power at her house, but told me that some other staff members were still blacked out.  Since we couldn't operate with no power, we posted signs on the building explaining why we were closed, and posted about it on social media.

I bicycled downtown to check at the Mayor's office.  I was startled to find that the street lights were about the only thing running downtown.  The Mayor's office was shut down without even a portable generator.  The newspaper office across the street did have one.  They were putting together the next issue in hopes that they would have power restored later in the day to run the press.

The Chamber of Commerce seemed to be the only place downtown that had normal power.  I asked the director about relief efforts.  She said that the county Baptist Association would do a meal distribution early that evening.  Another church was doing something similar elsewhere.  And the local food pantry had just received an emergency shipment from the food bank in Little Rock.

I went to the food pantry and spent a while helping them bag up the new supplies.  Then I went home and raked up minor storm debris from my elderly next door neighbors' yard.  Around five I cycled to the library and found that the power there was now on.  I notified the staff that we'd be back on the job in the morning. 

Then I cycled to the church where the county Baptist Association was distributing meals.  The director there told me that they'd distributed 500 meals the previous evening in the county seat, which was in worse shape than we were.  Tuesday evening they were distributing another 500 in our town.  Wednesday they had plans to distribute meals at another blacked-out town in the region.  Also on Wednesday, the Arkansas Baptist Association, which in recent years has become a major natural disaster relief organization in Arkansas and neighboring states (Heaven knows disasters have become common enough in recent years), was bringing its mobile kitchen to the county seat.

[apl68]

As of yesterday evening and this morning our downtown and most residential neighborhoods seem to have power restored.  But there are still a number of residential blocks blacked out.  We're still having internet issues at the library.  It's sort of working now.

I haven't heard anything from colleagues in the county seat.  I assume that they can't open.  Probably none of our county offices can.  A staff member who lives there was not able to come in today.  I heard this morning that the storm wrecked a substation, and that that part of the county will be lucky to have power restored by Friday.

We had other storms and a tornado elsewhere in the state.  The Governor has declared a state of emergency in the affected areas.  We've had no reports of anybody injured locally.  Trees did fall on several residences, but they were mostly vacant at the time.  We're thankful that there's been no loss of life.

[Morden]

My best wishes for your town and county.

[namazu]

I'm relieved to hear that there was no loss of life.  I hope your library and the area it serves will recover (relatively) quickly.  Wishing you all the best.

[lightning]

I'm glad to see that there is an organization that can provide some semblance of civilization, while infrastructure gets restored.

[Langue_doc]

apl68, I'm sorry to hear about the situation in your community. Hope the state and county officials know what resources are needed. I've been in a couple of disaster situations and had no electricity for about 10 days and no internet for about a couple of weeks in the aftermath of one event. Hang in there, sending you good wishes that things get back to normal soon.

[Wahoo Redux]

Thoughts and prayers, appl.

[apl68]

Thanks for the thoughts and prayers, everybody!  As of this morning we still had a few blocks near my house without power.  The line crews are down the alleys working on it.  Meanwhile, in the county seat, they've been trying to put the local substation back together.  It took a couple of days of all hands on deck just to clear the site.  It looks like the damage wasn't as severe as it could have been.  Most of the town is back on now.

A staff member who lives there said that the entire town was indeed down for days.  One convenience store had a generator so that they could pump gas and make some ice available.  The grocery store got running long enough to encourage people to come and buy as much of their stock as they could before they lost it.  And that was all that town had going!  There was much competition for available generators.  Our local hospital has good stand-by generators and was able to stay in operation.

Two guys at our church who work for the regional phone/internet company said that they'd been working long days.  Their internet service at our library is out.  The other service provider is somewhat running.  It costs us a fortune to have lines with two internet providers, but they're both so unreliable that we're reluctant to rely on one or the other exclusively.

City crews and volunteers have been busy clearing streets and roads.  One thing about living in a timber-producing regions--you've got plenty of locals who have chain saws and know how to use them!  The city paper did get full power restored in time to print the paper.  Storm damage pictures galore, plus a request from the Mayor that people keep fallen trees and branches separate from other types of debris, so that the city could collect them separately for environmental reasons.  Not sure what the Baptist Association is doing today, but since I haven't been able to get anybody at their office I'm guessing they're in the field working on something.

[Harlow2]

Sounds like real progress, APL. Hope the remaining disruption ends quickly.

[EdnaMode]

Glad they seem to be making some progress. As someone who lived for ten years in a hurricane zone, and went through several ice storms and tornadoes when I lived in the southern midwest, I can empathize with the havoc mother nature can wreak. Hope things continue on the upswing.

[apl68]

Just got back from the weekly lunchtime meeting of the local Rotary Club.  Our guest today was the regional Salvation Army director.  Our town is too small to have a Salvation Army shelter or thrift store of its own.  We do have a long-established local Salvation Army effort that assists people with utility bills and such emergencies.  I didn't realize that the near(ish) city has an active shelter.  They serve quite a few transients passing through the region.  And they now serve meals by the thousand due to the recent rise in food insecurity.  They had been preparing to bring a mobile kitchen into this area to assist with our disaster, but it looks like the worst of the needs here are now winding up.

When the Major was done speaking, the Rotary member who had invited him spoke as well.  She has been the local Salvation Army point person for several years, and has been involved in a number of other service and relief efforts.  She commented on the generosity she has seen in our community, and noted that most of those in the room had given her money before for one or another of her projects.

Then she said something that most of us had not known.  I knew that she had once had a history of drug use, including at least one jail term.  I had not know that she spent some time homeless while living in another city in the state.  She had landed herself in that position due to drug use and other bad decisions.  She lived out of her car, until she no longer had one. 

She said that she remembered different people helping her during that time.  Some met her immediate physical needs.  And some gave her actual hope that encouraged her to look at getting out of the life she was in.  Which, after that jail term gave her a final wake-up call, she did.  She said that was why she was always hustling for money to help people out.  She said you never know when you might be the one to give somebody the hope they really need at that point.

We got more than we bargained for from the program today.  She's an amazing example of a life transformed by God.

[hmaria1609]

I'm sorry about what happened in your area! I'm glad you're (and your staff and neighbors) all right. Please keep us posted when you're able.

[paultuttle]

Ditto. And I hope things keep looking up for you and your community.

[apl68]

As of yesterday the power seems to have been generally restored in all of our region's towns.  We seem to be pretty well back to normal.  There's still quite a bit of clean-up to be done here and there.

Thank you, everybody, for the expressions of support.