Southern Baptist Disaster Relief - 2012 HURRICANE SANDY

SBDR Hurricane Sandy Update

Friday, November 2, the 72 hour mark passed for the SBDR
response due to super storm Sandy. In that time frame,
an Area Command and 5 Incident Commands have been established
in affected areas. Mobile kitchens are open and currently
have the capacity to prepare 170,000 meals. By Sunday, an
additional 100,000 meal capacity will be operational.
Currently, 25 recovery units are working in Maryland, West
Virginia, New Jersey, New York and New England. Largely due
to the tireless work of DR volunteers, Southern Baptist response
to the storm is ahead of schedule.

Praise God for the work that has already been accomplished
in such a short amount of time. Praise God for those who
have and will volunteer to respond. Pray for the safety
of the volunteers who are already serving and for those
en route to serve in affected areas. Pray they will proclaim
the praises of the One who has sent them to accomplish the
monumental task at hand.

Large Task Ahead
On Thursday, November 1, all large capacity mobile
kitchens in the DR fleet east of the Rocky Mountains
were asked to mobilize in response to Hurricane Sandy.
NAMB trustees authorized the entity to cover the travel
expenses for state conventions that need assistance in
mobilizing their DR teams to the region. This will
allow SBDR to meet the goal of preparing a
minimum of 400,000 meals a day by Monday, November 5.

Fritz Wilson, North American Mission Board Disaster
Relief executive director, shared with state DR
directors on Friday during a conference call,
“Thanks for taking a step of faith and committing
resources for this unprecedented response. We kicked
the door holding us down. God will do some miraculous
things through this.”

DR units are headed to Raritan Valley Baptist Church,
Edison, NJ for staging. Mike Flannery, NY state DR
director, has been working diligently to overcome
challenges in NY to make way for feeding units to
arrive in the state this weekend. Teams from AR,
MI and MO will arrive Friday with additional units
arriving on Saturday.

Eddie Blackmon, DR liaison stationed at the national
headquarters of The American Red Cross (ARC), thanked
state DR directors for doing a “great job of getting
teams in location despite some frustrations. NY is a
difficult place but we are going to learn a lot of
great lessons.” Blackmon shared that ARC is already
asking for more meals but SBDR will wait to commit
until the 400,000 a day count is met. He assured
state directors, “teams coming in will have an
opportunity to serve.”