Hurricane Katrina went across Florida, not actually doing a whole lot of damage. She was only a category 1 when she made landfall in Florida, so nobody there was worried. A category-1 hurricane is more like a bad thunderstorm to Floridians. Grocery stores don't close down for them and you can still even get a piping hot Papa John's pizza in the middle of the storm. That is how desensitized Floridians are to a category-1 (and sometimes 2) hurricane.
However, Katrina was a category-4 hurricane when she hit Louisiana and Mississippi. I'm sure you've all seen on the various news stations the havoc that has been wrought in New Orleans and all along the northern Gulf Coast. Not only do they need volunteers to help take care of the victims, they also need security forces to assist the Louisiana National Guard. That's what this entry is all about.
Apparently, there are too many looters and people shooting and the National Guard is having trouble keeping this at bay, so they've caled on the XVIII Airborne Corps (including my unit, the 108th Airborne Air Defense Artillery Brigade) for assistance. All XVIII ABC units are deployable to anywhere in the world in 24 hours. We received unofficial word that we may be deployed to Louisiana to assist. Once the order comes down from Brigade, my Company -- 208th Signal -- will have 3 hours to assemble our Soldiers and get our gear ready for transport. That includes drawing weapons from the arms room and falling into Brigade formation.
However, we haven't received any official orders, so we're just standing by for now. A buddy of mine from Fort Gordon is now in the 82nd Airborne Division over at Fort Bragg, and he called here to let us (myself and another buddy from Fort Gordon) know that he was already on his way over there.
It's great, I'll finally be able to feel like a soldier for a few weeks, maybe even a month or two. I was actually supposed to go on another mission with another brigade for the next three weeks, but it looks as though that mission will be cancelled; it was just a training exercise.
I don't know when or if we'll get the order, but all my gear is squared away and I'm ready to go. Just waiting for the telephone to ring. I'll try to let everybody know before I actually head out.
ReLik
Mon Sep 5th 09:01:23 2005
hope you kick some ass.
LaVa
Wed Sep 14th 19:16:26 2005
Yeah the 504th left a few days ago and are expected to stay down there for a couple months. With half of Bragg deployed its nice you can go to a club and not have GI's all over the place, but their girlfriends and wives are still there.