Hey Everyone- Sorry for not updating this in so long. I got back to Corvallis Monday night, and it’s just been a rush to get back on top of life ever since. But while I’m home, it doesn’t mean that the work there is done. Far from it! I’m still involved in the work in some capacity, but I’m still trying to figure out how much I can do remotely and all. So there will be updates from time to time as I have things to share, but probably not as frequently. Like now. I want to share with you all an update Joe R. sent from the field right after I left. I think it does a pretty good job explaining how things are going.
I did a goodwill visit to several of our locations in Biloxi on Wednesday. In the process, we got requests for service at four new locations. Today, the team is in the process of installing computers and ATAs with POTs phones in the Biloxi Community Center on Howard Ave. This location is providing free medical service, food, clothes, and various home supplies to members of the community as well as relief workers in the area. This location is being run by the City of Biloxi in conjunction with the American Red Cross. On Saturday, we are scheduled to install a 4 phone bank in the Salvation Army Command and Control trailer which is located at Yankee Stadium in Biloxi. We completely wired a location a location in Pass Christian over a two day period. This location has a medical facility that is seeing an average of approximately 300 patients a day. They are also serving meals, providing food and supplies to the community, and housing and feeding relief workers. They estimate that 1100 people per day come through to get supplies. The team installed 4 donated computers and set up a slick wall mounted phone bank of 3 ATAs with 6 phones. Everyone here was very nice and could not stop thanking us and telling us what a good job we were doing. The site director informed us that he had called both the local cable and phone companies for voice and data service, and was told it would not be available until the end of the year.
We installed an Tranzeo link from Long Beach to Pass Christian, tying into the Mac Dearman/Radio Response network. Thanks, Mac and Joe Miller. Then the radio started acting very funny on us, so we swapped in an Atlas 45mb link Tuesday night and it has run like a top ever since. The team wired up a new medical clinic in Biloxi that is being run by Islamic Relief and Coast Medical Group (they ran the clinic we wired in D’Iberville). This is going to be another free medical facility right on Division Street in Biloxi. They are estimating seeing approximately 200-300 patients a day at this facility. We connected them up with 7 full workstations, which include an Apple G4 system, ATA, and phone. At Compassion Central, located in Biloxi Yankee Stadium, we wired up two locations. The first was a command RV being used by Compassion Central. This group has been in Biloxi since the first few days after the storm. They are providing meals, food, clothes, activities for children, school tutors, house cleanup, etc. for the community members. We installed a computer, two phones, and hooked their existing laptops up to the network.
The second location was the Salvation Army Communications trailer. The commo guy, expressed his displeasure with the MCI/SkyTel link that was down more than up. We provided him an ATA, phone, and router. When we went back the next day, he could not stop telling us how much he appreciated the service. We have been spending some time trying to get Network Monitoring up. As it stands now we are using MRTG to monitor our links on the network. The goal is to have a full Nagios system up and running in the next week or so, this is my remote job until I back to D’Iberville in two weeks.
There are several things that we are short on, the most pressing item now is people. We are in desperate need of tower climbers / installers. We have gear and locations, but there are not enough people to go around. Ideally we would like to provide service to someone the day they ask for it, but it is taking us a day or so to fulfill all of the requests. The more people we get the more locations we have the ability to take on and connect. There are several other things happening in the background noise. Myself, and a few others, are trying to secure equipment donations to ensure that our network is robust and redundant. It is beginning to appear that the relief effort in the area is starting to lose steam as Hurricane Katrina fades out of media coverage and some peoples’ minds. I can assure everyone that reads this message, that there is more than enough to do in the Gulf Coast region of Mississippi. Everywhere you turn there is someone that is in need in some type of assistance. I encourage everyone to fill out the volunteer form on line, talk to the volunteer coordinators at part-15 and take some time and come down here to help out. Anytime you can give to the cause is worth it. It is a great feeling to know you are actually making a difference in someone’s everyday life. When you are here working you are not just giving a few dollars to disorganized, useless, national organizations that have just begun working in the areas we have been in for weeks. You are making a real difference, and the people we are helping on the ground here let you know it all the time.
