calling me bozo does not enhance your credibility around here.
Take a break, please.
Here is a 40+ year old news account that may be of interest today.
Excerpt on Account of the Flood in Hattiesburg, Mississippi in 1961
Citizens of the southern United States are well aware of flood hazards, and they, too, react in predictable and unpredictable ways. Major floods used to sweep into Savannah every fifteen or twenty years. The Mississippi, since DeSoto's time, has had at least fifty outstanding floods. In the winter of 1961, heavy rains in the Deep South swelled many a river, particularly the Leaf and Bouie. At the confluence of these two sits the town of Hattiesburg, Mississippi, where, in the raging silt-laden waters, children were drowned, homes swept away, and business ruined.
But it was the spirit of the people, their reaction to disaster, their unity, that seemed most impressive to Hattiesburg citizens and to rescuers. A Red Cross official wished afterwards that there were some way to recapture that spirit. It was something he could not describe.
Everyone within miles plunged in to assist. The Red Cross came; the National Guard organized an evacuation team; a boat pool of Coast Guard auxiliary personnel and volunteers was made up; schools, churches, and motels were filled with refugees; and businessmen, Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts, Salvation Army volunteers, and many other helper pitched in.
Side by side they worked and side by side they crowded into temporary shelters. Everything led to a demonstration of the "true soul of our people," as a high school principal stated it. There was no color line whatsoever, the mayor said; Negroes and whites "sweated it out together," as one woman described the work ; "it's something I won't forget."
Neither would the survivors forget how, in the aftermath, they would be given a new start in life by the rescue agencies that had come to help them.
"The most important help I can get," said one old man to a Red Cross case worker, "is a home for my mule, Ella. Ella had a real nice home in a shed next to my house, but I haven't seen that since the water came through.... it just plain floated away."
"Now, old Ella is getting on in years and can't stand the night cold like she used to."
The request was approved.
Source: Nature On the Rampage, A Natural History of the Elements, Ann and Myron Sutton, J.B. Lippincott, 1962, p. 186.
You don't get credibility in life from anonymous internet postings.
You get it from helping people and doing the right thing when no ones looking.
You have to understand there are people posting on this forum who have experience in dealing with logistics and have participated in disaster operations around the world.
I can't find a link anywhere to confirm but the CNN news scroll is stating that the middle eastern country of Qatar has offered 100 million for Hurricane relief.
I am stunned (even stuned). I am on record from early on saying the rest of the world can suck eggs, we don't need their help. It sure is nice though to see the offers coming in.
Condi Rice was most touched by Sri Lanka's offer of aid. A reporter asked why we would consider accepting aid from such a poor nation, especially considering that the US is still giving them aid. Her answer was much more eloquent but she said it makes a nation and its people feel good about themselves to help out. Sri Lanka offered very little and we could live without it but the act of giving made them feel proud.