"palmtreedreamer" wrote in
oups.com:

In St. Thomas USVI lots of people got rich off of the Red Cross but the
RC was there to help. People would get 18 cook stoves by going to 18
outposts and then sell 17 on the black market. I know this to happen
but there are 100's that don't do that and actaully get help.



In Charleston, SC, 1989, Hurricane Hugo, not one single "agency" or other
bureaucracy did a damned thing for anyone that I ever met or know,
personally. Nothing...NADA. We looked out for ourselves. We cleaned the
trees, wires, smashed cars and other debris out of the street in the
subdivision I was lucky enough to be a survivor in in Summerville, SC. It
took us 2 weeks of 10 hour days to cut our way out to the main entrance.
We ran out of gas a few times and had to scour for more dead cars to steal
fuel from to keep the chain saws running. No Red Cross bureaucrats were
ever seen in their shiny trucks, wearing their pseudo-military smart
uniforms advertising the company logos...nothing.

Once we were out of the neighborhood, we were going nowhere. The main
roads were still "waiting" for the "agencies". Right across from the main
entrance was a Scotchman convenience store/gas station full of gas with no
power. I had been powering the house I was staying in from the 7.5KW Onan
gas genset in their motorhome I was sleeping in with a haywire rig of cut
up lawn cables. We had plenty of power, even AC, water from their swimming
pool once I got the electric pump installed stolen from a neighbor's water
fountain. Before the storm, every vessel of every kind was filled in the
house, in the motorhome, in the garage. Drinking water wasn't a problem.
Even the bathtub was washed down, sanitized and filled with drinking, not
flushing, water. We drank it first because it was exposed. Noone got
sick. Noone needed water. We did have to refill the icemaker by hand
because the city cut off the water to stop us from flushing the toilets.
Well, I made a deal with the Scotchman owner/manager to provide him with
electric power during the day from the motorhome....in swap for full tanks
to power the house and all the neighbor's refrigerators stacked in the
garage all night. My friends we stayed with had a FREEZER STUFFED WITH
STEAK! Her parents were dairy farmers...(c; I still don't eat steak any
more...yecch.

This arrangement was modified to 4 hours per day and the owner and I
decided to keep one of his underground tanks 5000 gallons for ourselves.
It was a great arrangement for both of us. He sold off his stock that was
still good and got more, except perishables because I couldn't power the
big walkin cooler and his pumps out front at the same time. He continued
to provide me fuel even after we had procured a 20KW diesel genset which I
hooked to the station's power panel for him.

As to the "agency" which did my family and other families I know the most
good? I'd say the Bi-Lo Corporation, who owned the Bi-Lo food store by my
pet shop was probably our saviour as the food was running out a month after
the storm. Bi-Lo finally got huge tractor trailers full of water in gallon
jugs, reefer trucks full of ice and other trucks full of food in a constant
barrage of stuff into that store. I also had a hand in getting the store
back in operation.....

I had done a favor for some guys from Asplundt (sp?) Tree Service, who were
working 24/7 for the power company clearing the lines. My phone worked
when their truck died in front of the shopping center. Their radio died
with the truck battery. Seeing power come back on the main highway at
about 1.3 months after the storm, our shopping center's branch 23KV line
was still down. So, I camped out at the SCE&G local crew quarters for a
few hours hanging around the haggard-looking crews looking for a favor.
After I explained to the boss what I was after, he said he didn't have
anyone to do the tree work. I waited until I saw those tree guys I'd
helped drive in and called in my marker..(c; We cleared the trees and I
went back to the power company crew quarters to get a truck. I got two!
The manager of the Bi-Lo store was SO nice to me when all of a sudden all
those compressors in the back room just came to life! He just said, "You
come to me when you need groceries. I got plenty for you, now!"

No "agencies"....no "bureaucrats"....Thank you Bi-Lo Corporation. I've
never forgotten it, either. Precisely my point of the donations.
Charleston was SWIMMING in MONEY after Hugo, once we dug our way out of the
trees. Insurance money just POURED into this place. We missed 2
recessions everyone else suffered. We all got new roofs/houses/cars/stuff.

I never figured out what FEMA, SC Emergency Preparedness and the local
bureaucrats did. They didn't do anything for anyone I knew....

--
Larry