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IAMILLE: 20 Years Later
Page 5
Camille
Continued from Page 4
iuardsmen, on the Coast as part of heir weekend-warrior routine, set >ut in amphibious vehicles to pluck ibout 1,000 soaked, frightened vic-ims out of trees and from atop oofs and utility poles. But the men ould not rescue all from the night-nare, and some ended up retreat-ig to attics, or worse yet, floating r buried in the debris of their louses.
Coast homes destroyed: 6,744.
Homes damaged: 46,709.
Businesses were treated no bet-er. Chief among those stories is VLOX-TV, then located in the luena Vista Hotel on the beach in Jiloxi. Early in the evening, Ray Butterfield had decided to take the isses in company equipment and tay on the air rather than flee arly. His pleas to evacuate and the ital information transmitted until raves destroyed the equipment re credited with saving thousands lore lives.
Coast businesses destroyed or >adly damaged: 746.
'esting the faith of thousands
Camille showed little mercy to he houses of God. Dozens were lamaged, gutted or turned into ubble, and congregations were ;iven a true test of religious trength. She stole the main sanc-uary of the Episcopal Church of he Redeemer in Biloxi, but mirae-lously left behind the historic bell ower. Saint Thomas in Long teach didn’t have a sanctuary left.
Flexing her biceps to the ex-•eme, Camille pushed three giant argo ships on to what had been eveloped port land in Gulfport, hie was refloated, but the others ad to be cut into scrap.
Playfully, she freed all but three f Marine Life’s trained sea lions nd porpoises, which was no free-om at all for they could not fend >r themselves. Camille expertly owled over other tourists attrac-ons, but with a sense of humor,
left one lone dinosaur standing at a miniature golf course on the flattened Bilo)d. Strip. ______
Before the night was over, she had dined sumptuously on £0 seafood factories. Shrimpers believe their catch has never been as large since Camille’s wrecking ball sliced through the Mississippi Sound.
Like a child run amuck in a toy factory, she steered shrimp boats, tugs, barges and other vessels into the most unlikely places. One trawler was set on railroad tracks; dozens more were left high and dry.
Boats destroyed or damaged: unknown hundreds.
Camille turned another major industry into toothpicks when she ravaged 1.9 million acres of commercial forests. She took a $41,000 bite out of the seawall, damaged railroad tracks to the tune of $2 million and silenced^ 80,000 telephones. Big chunks of U.S. 90 lay like dominoes; bridges looked like giant feet had crushed select sections.
She drowned 8,000 head of cattle and countless wildlife and beloved pets. Some dogs and cats were later shot by military men who had to steel their hearts with the fact there was no help,' no food and little manpower to round them up alive.
Power lines, gas mains and water supplies became unusable, often for weeks. Bottled water and body odor became common place. Queues formed for food, clothing and financial aid, and like no other time in history, Coast communities finked hands and buried rivalries.
A fighting spirit rose from the rubble, much like the survival instinct that awakens in war-bombed communities. Residents rallied together, but seemed to save their aggressiveness for insurance companies. For two years, court dockets would be filled by business and home owners venting their frustrations — sometimes unjustly — on the insurers. They made the easiest target, though many companies were praised for their speed and good claims.
Outside help poured in
Heart-felt dollars and supplies from countless other communities poured in to salve Camille’s wounds. A We Care Fund collected $1.3 million, but in the overall picture, that was a drop in the storm bucket. Salvation Army and the Red Cross contributed millions in supplies, aid and volunteer efforts.
Federal, state, church and private agencies and the military poured in from across the country to help with enforcement of martial law and recovery. The grand total, in dollars, is impossible to calculate.
Keesler Air Force Base airmen and Naval Construction Battalion Seabees forever endeared themselves to the Coast, whose communities they treated like their own beleaguered hometowns.
In the first week alone, 25 tons of dead animals were removed by the military and the Army Corps of Engineers. Before clean-up was over, millions of tons of debris — crushed cars, splintered houses, uprooted trees, etc. — were plowed into 27 disposal sites.
The last victim was dug out of Pass Christian rubble 31 days after Camille’s visit and one week after President Richard Nixon addressed a crowd gathered at the Biloxi-Gulfport Regional Airport.
“I predict that the people of Mississippi, particularly in the area of great destruction, will come up from this destruction, ” Nixon said. “You will not only rebuild, but build a new area with new ideas. What a challenge this is! I’m confident you will meet it and become a greater people than you were before.”
The Coast, for the most part, did thumb its collective noses at Camille’s attempts to subjugate. The tiniest sign of defiance appeared in late August when the pear trees burst into bloom — an unseasonal symbol of rejuvenation.
■ Sun Herald microfilm, Charles Sullivan’s 1987 book, "Hurricanes of the Mississippi Gulf Coast” and the memory of this writer were used as background for this Coast Chronicle.
An aerial view of Gulfport on the day after Camille.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
JIM LUND/THE DAIL
lie U.S. 90 bridge linking Ocean Springs with Biloxi was knocked askew by the storm. Some of the sections were raised 3 feet above others.