Grab Bag
So I’m on my way to Montecito, California to cover the worst wildfire there in 30 years. Still five hours away, it already feels like the Santa Anna wind gusts have gotten to us… blowing our vehicle from lane to lane and almost into every 18-wheeler we pass. My veteran photographer, Todd Martin, calms my fears by telling me it’s the worst wind he’s ever driven through… as he white-knuckles the steering wheel and grits his teeth. Just across the Arizona-California border on I-10, we are in the middle of a valley… and the valley is in the middle of a sand storm.
We are fully prepared for this trip (as of this writing). Our vehicle is a news “live truck” which is basically a full-size van tricked out with equipment that allows us to edit our stories and feed them back to the station in Phoenix by microwave signal. Unfortunately, the fire is about 460 miles from Channel 3, much too far for our signal strength. We will have to hook up with a CNN satellite truck in order to do our live shots. But that’s ok. It was all part of the plan. The same went for stocking our truck with food, water, five different cameras and each a bag stuffed with a weeks worth of clothes. I’ve had that bag, or one like it, tucked in the trunk of my car for almost a decade now.
When I was a rookie reporter in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, hurricanes were the “wildfires” of the South. And while we had more time to strategize our coverage and make preparations, I always wanted to be the first one ready. If my boss, by chance, asked me if I could head out hundreds of miles away with a photographer to Pensacola, Florida or Mobile, Alabama for a “big one,” I didn’t want him to have time to second guess his choice. “But it’s on your day off.” I don’t care. “But you need to be on air at 5pm – no time to pack.” Yeah, well, my bag is packed… in my car… I’ll grab it. See you on TV.
That scenario played out nearly a dozen times over the next few years.
In those days, that bag was packed with all the essentials: rain gear, cargo shorts, station-embroidered polo shirts, underwear, Crocs sandals and every MRE (Meal, Ready to Eat) I managed to swipe in my days in the Army. Most of the year, it would remain lonely and musty, sun-baking in the trunk. But its value to me was what it represented… opportunity, anxiety, fear, excitement. I may never pull that bag out. Or I may need it tomorrow. But I surely won’t miss out on the big story because someone else was better prepared.
So proud of my preparation, I thought I had it down to a science. Keep the bag as light and mobile is possible. (I’d heard of live trucks getting flooded by storm surge and news crews that had to hike their way to safety lugging all their gear) I made sure I could strap my bag on my back and still carry a tripod and battery charger if things got hairy.
Enter: Hurricane Katrina.
On a humid Friday morning in August of 2005, I was starting my 5th day on the job as a reporter for New Orleans CBS affiliate, WWL-TV. There was a hurricane that had just crossed the southern tip of Florida and lost a lot of strength but would likely build back up and take a second swing at the panhandle part of that state. My meteorologist put his money on Navarre Beach, Florida. And my new News Director put her money on the new reporter… or may be she just wanted to welcome me with a little baptism by fire. I didn’t even have a key to the building or a password to my computer yet. I barely knew where the bathroom was. But none of that mattered. I knew where my bag was when the boss asked if I could bounce three states over “for the weekend.” After all, she knew the drill… and after covering hurricanes for five years… two in just the month prior… so did I:
1. Fuel up the sat truck and bring extra full gas tanks.
2. Get into ground zero two days before the storm.
3. Shoot “before” video, preparations, interview locals about whether they will ride it out or evacuate, and do round the clock live shots for countless affiliated TV stations.
4. Do stand-up shots in 115 mph wind to exhibit why being in hurricane force winds is dangerous.
5. Cover the aftermath – the damage, the clean up and head home.
6. Oh, and of course, before all that – pack only the essentials.
After we talked to homeowners in Navarre Beach about the severity of the impending hurricane and witnessed the fear on their faces, we did 5, 6 and 10pm live shots. I got about 5 hours of sleep. The phone rang. Katrina had sustained winds of 175 mph and had shifted her path 180 miles west. Ground Zero was now my new hometown … and the most vulnerable city on the Gulf for a major hurricane.
You witnessed the video. You saw the destruction. You heard the cries in the wake of Katrina on every news station in the country. But even with my self-proclaimed status as “Master of Preparation,” I wasn’t remotely ready for what I would see when the east side of Katrina’s eye wall finished battering our shelter in the Emergency Preparedness Office in Biloxi, Mississippi. And I wasn’t prepared for what it would take to get home.
The building was about a half mile inland, and outside, the destruction surrounded us and stretched much farther inland. A little closer to the Gulf, tractor-trailers had been tossed hundreds of yards, entire Casino cruise ships were washed onto land. It was a magnified version of litter washed up on a beach, multiplied ten times. Nothing around us escaped Katrina’s fury and it was obvious this aftermath would take a little longer to cover. There was no way to know exactly what to expect after that Monday’s newscasts.
When we walked to our SUV to take a ride around, all thee windows on the right side were gone, glass shards covering the seats and floor. Everything inside was soaked. The radio was leaking water and unusable. The charger outlets were already rusting – obviously offering no juice to our cell phones or GPS. Not that it mattered because there was no signal anyway and wouldn’t be one for weeks.
The normally one hour drive to the North Shore of New Orleans took about eight hours through back roads, often at a dead stop as the National Guard soldiers chain sawed and cleared trees that crisscrossed the roadways. We made it to Slidell in time to shoot some video and get interviews. It wasn’t a hard assignment considering the degree of destruction. The stories were around every corner, in every home… in every pair of eyes that gazed at us with a hazy dissolution.
For the next four days, we worked for about 15 hour shifts. And there was still not enough time or videotape to capture the effect of this storm’s fury. One family of four adults, six children, including an infant, that we talked to was walking on a roadside looking for any store that could offer baby formula and diapers. Nothing was open for dozens of miles… and on foot, that creates a dilemma. They had three boxes of formula left. Like me, they knew the drill, figuring this was a storm that would hit quickly and blow by. So they did the grab-bag they’d done a million times: packed light and strategically before going to a friend’s home to ride out Katrina. Their house, cars and baby food were now eight feet under water.
As we finished our interviews and well-wishes, we headed out to capture the countless other stomach churning stories that surrounded us. It was the Friday after K-Day – 100 plus hours of stagnant floodwater, relentless humidity and a beaming sun… and no way to buy the necessities.
On the main road through Slidell, we passed a fruit stand that had only suffered wind damage. Wooden tables were broken and upside down. There was no roof or cash register or neatly stacked produce. But the owners, a couple probably in their early 40s, had managed to salvage some apples and bananas and whatever else they could sell that had been strewn all over the ground. And it was the most popular place around.
A husband and wife sifted through the selection on the tables that were propped up with pallets and ice chests. Their clothes were soaking wet – I don’t know if it was from sweating in a 100 degree home without electricity or from wading through water in their home trying to find whatever food or supplies they could. With a four-day beard and sunburned cheeks, the man clung to a five-dollar bill and two singles. It would get them several days worth of fruit and veggies for three children who waited at a neighbor’s house – the lucky ones who only got a foot of flooding. They bagged up their own oranges and cantaloupe and spinach and handed over their soaked seven bucks, which the owner tucked into something like a tin cigar box.
Had this mother and father not been prepared for the fallout of a hurricane’s direct hit? Had the fruit stand owners not known to fortify their business so they could better serve the needs of their neighbors in the aftermath and, at the same time, capitalize on the opportunity? Well, they had all grabbed a bag and taken shelter and done what they had always done. After all, history taught them that it would be a three-day “inconvenience.” If you get hit, you get up, clean up and move on. But this hit changed the game. And now it became the blame game!
As 80 percent of the city of New Orleans sat drowning under water, “preparation” was the target of the critics – and everyone was a critic without enough fingers to point. The mayor let evacuation buses flood. The governor didn’t call a “State of Emergency” early enough. The president didn’t send federal aid in time. FEMA was MIA.
And I learned my bag wasn’t packed well enough either… because Katrina didn’t conform to my experiences covering her colleagues. After eight days, I had blisters and some kind of rash on my feet from wading in floodwater in my sandals without the luxury of a daily shower. I was re-wearing cargo shorts and t-shirts that were still damp from a previous mission soaking up sweat and the “toxic” gumbo. I remember I sort of smelled like my footlocker did in Boot Camp. If you haven’t had the fortune of having one, it’s not exactly Downy-fresh. The MREs ran out a couple days after the storm although the stories did not. Neither did our obligation to cover them. We made it work.
More than three years later, I’m still working to perfect my packing… the bag is the same, but the contents have changed a little. No rain jacket or sandals. I have fire-retardant yellow shirts and steel shank boots (to protect from nails in the charred beams of burned out homes that I will likely be walking through).
So as we roll towards Montecito on the edge of Santa Barbara, the smoke is thick. It blocks our view of the hills we will be driving into to do our live shots. We have 15 minutes before our hit time when we park next to the CNN sat truck. My producers already had some edited video ready to show as I talk in front of a mountainside full of mansions that are gone… only smoldering ashes and chimneys remain. A shot at five o’clock and another at six go smoothly. We get more video and do more interviews with victims and put a story together for the 9 o’clock show.
The next morning, the fire is 10 percent contained and likely soon to be under control. Our orders are to end the mission and return to base. After grabbing a complimentary a bagel from the hotel lobby, we head east towards Phoenix. At least we’ll be home in time for some college football games.
But about 50 minutes from Los Angeles, the radio waves are chock-full of fear. With a notebook and pen in hand, I scribble down the numbers. Overnight, 3,000 acres of land burned in the northern part of the city… already double the size of the fire we had just left. 500 homes were destroyed. The Santa Anna winds will likely be gusting to 70 plus mph again tonight. Hundreds of homes are threatened. And the mayor of Los Angeles is offering no encouragement in a press conference – only saying the flames have already accounted for more loss of property in the city than any other single fire ever.
And it’s about 10 miles north of an interstate exit we will be passing. Todd and I make an executive decision that we cannot ignore the magnitude of this story and will ask for forgiveness rather than permission, if we need to… after we capture some of on tape.
As we get into LA, the entire sky to our north is a brown, murky blanket sinking all the way down to street level. Highways are closed down, and ashes are shattering on our windshield well before we are even close. Making our way into the area which other cars are fleeing from, people are in their driveways, stuffing their back seats with pictures and insurance papers. They are preparing with very little warning.
On the radio, the weatherman says forecast calls for high temps, more wind and more fire… maybe much more. I turn around and take a look at that bag. How long could I be here? I didn’t plan for this. Am I prepared to adapt? Hope so!
“Prepared” is now a very fluid concept.
To be continued…