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CAMILLE: 20 Years Later
P
DENNIS HOLSTON
Camille made sure people noticed her: A family that lived two blocks from the beach in Pass Christian found this car in the bedroom after she passed by.
Bay-Waveland: Second decade brings recovery
By EDGAR H. PEREZ
THE SUN HERALD
Bay St. Louis and Waveland were left in a state of shock for almost ten years following the knockout punch landed by Hurricane Camille in 1969.
Even Mother Nature was ravished by the awesome storm, an event by which residents of the area measure all others, before and since.
“All the Spanish moss was stripped off the Live oak trees, and it took ten years for it to make a comeback,” said Bay St. Louis businessman Dave McDonald.
“It takes that long after a storm like Camille before a place doesn’t look like a battlefield,” he said. “For years around here it looked
Water this high
■	First-time visitors always say “I don’t believe it” when they see this plaque marking the Hurricane Camille high-water mark at Camille Tate’s Mimosa Street residence in Pass Christian Isles.
The marker shows that water reached 21.4 feet above sea level; winds hit 200 mph at 10 p.m.; and barometric pressure plunged to 26.61 inches of mercury during the storm.
EDGAR PEREZ’SUN HERALD STAFF WRITER
like we had taken an artillery shelling.
Other business and political leaders agree that the first decade after. Camille was spent trying to recover what was lost in the storm. Only in the second decade, from 1979 to the present, has economic
progress been evident, they said.
Waveland today is a boom town compared to the economic conditions of 1979. Bay St. Louis, with little area to grow, is planning an industrial development agency of its own to spur economic growth within the city.
Western Coast hardest hit
The eye of the storm came ashore along the Hancock County coastline and along the western edge of Harrison County. It deliv-
Please see BAY, Page 11


Hurricane Camille Camille-20-Years-Later (09)
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