Charlieb Lives in the Heart of New Orleans

Well tonight or tomorrow morning is another D-Day for us, since we've been getting ready all day and biting our nails over whether or not to leave everything again to avoid the possibility of rising water or wind damage from Rita.
So far there's no evacuation order since the weathermen are saying only tropical storm strength winds and 3-5" of rain here, so long as the storm doesn't shift to the east anymore. So most people are intending to stay, however, the slightest shift will cause massive evacuation so we have to be ready at a moment's notice.
So this one's a nail biter cus it's so close to us and we'll have to move quickly.
Please pray for us.
I'll keep you all posted.
Thanks for all the support and prayers.
Charlie Brown.

Thank God thus far we're only being buffeted by 40-50mph winds here and the storm is down to 125mph. I think soon(by later tonight) we'll be out of the dangerous N.E. quadrant bands of rain and tornado zone.
Everyone here(west of N.O.) is honkered down and doesn't anticipate to have to evacuate again, although still ready. Also, since I'm somewhat trapped inside without much to do, I'm at least getting in some reading about trees and climbing etc.
So far then, there's good news here and I believe the prayers have brought this storm down in strength.
I'll update ya'll a little later tonight if anyone would like to know.
Thanks,
Charlie Brown.

The 9th district levee is breeched again, as CNN shows it. Will this affect you? How high are you if other breeches occur?

Tell us when your mail service returns so we can send personal care packages to you.

Your daughter's college relocation at Emory University puts her a mere mile and a half from my home here in Atlanta. She can expect some meals and useful Atlanta information. For all of you here on the board, this is her first time out away from home, now 2 weeks out. Her name is Tiffany.

It's 9:45pm here now. The wind is still blowing and howling at about 40-50 mph, the rain has stopped though, but we are still under a tornado watch till 6am.
The breeched levees in New Orleans won't effect us here in the suburbs. The 17th St. canal breech at the Jefferson-Orleans line could effect us, but it is holding thus far and would have to flood all of the Jefferson Parish area before it would reach me since I live against the Ms. river which is all the way across the Parish from that canal and am much higher in sea level.
So we're almost out of the woods, --I mean danger zone here, thank God.
This storm is very very solid in its hurricane strength wall portion which is about 90 miles on either side of the eye, and the eye is about 40 miles wide, so we're talking a total of 230 miles of solid hurrican force wind and water and a storm surge of about 25ft w/o counting the heighth of the waves on top the surge. So don't let the diminshed 125mph winds fool you because it is very solid or unrelenting within this hurricane zone. They measured a wave in the gulf a few hours ago at a buoy at 60ft.--incredible.
Please pray for Port Arthur, Tx and Lake Charles, LA, because the meteorologists are expecting this 25ft+ water surge to penetrate and travel over 80miles inland!
Can you imagine a 35ft. wall of water traveling over that distance?!-incredible.
Then it may very well stall and dump over 21 inches of rain.

My daughter had to be sent away very quickly to Emory U., who waived her tuition and boarding for victims of Katrina, very fortunately. However, this was the first time away from home in her life. She was very scared and traumatized, but knew she had to go in order to continue her semester or she would lose a whole year of school. Peter was so gracious, as to offer some assistance and support once he found out she just happened to be living within a mile of his home--what a coincidence!?--or as we call it, a Godincidence for those who believe.
Our mail service should be running again soon and will let ya'll know.
Again, guys, thanks for all your support and prayers.
What a wonderful comfort you guys have been during this time of crisis for so many!
What a great site this is, made up of even greater people!

It's good to see a sharing and caring forum.

Jim

Well we survived a hellish night getting pounded by the outer bands of Rita.
Not much damage in the area of the New Orleans outskirts where I live and thank God the 17th St. canal temporary steel levee shield held, so there was no flooding.
So now it's on to recovery which is a daunting task. --My business is in shambles as well as homes and streets. But the good news is as we redo everything, then all things become new, like starting life over again with a fresh outlook and all your things better than they ever were. Sounds like someone said this before somewhere--"All things work together for good for those who love God".
Anyway brothers, thanks again for all the encouragement and words of support.
Please don't forget us now, because the recovery is the slow and hard part and victims tend to be forgotten over a short time.
Hopefully soon I'll be able to give back to this great community of tree brothers and sisters.
Charlie Brown.

Charlie,

How's New Orleans doing?

Regards,
JimK

Keep FIT - Fun in Trees

Things are looking up here finally. More businesses are opening each day.
Everyone's repairing their houses feverishly.
The streets are still full of garbage which still hasn't been picked up yet after 5 weeks.
The tree work is booming.
At least it's dry and much cleaner looking.
My comments above only applies to the suburbs where I live, however, for the heart of New Orleans itself, things are still like a ghost town with armies of utility workers, etc. repairing and not many people returning yet since there's hardly any utilities yet, houses are water logged and streets are still full of mud from the flood waters. It's like a completely different town there. Funny how the hurricane almost perfectly diferentiated between N.O. and the western suburbs.
Anyway, everyone's pulling together, businesses including mine are still trying to recover their customer base or find extra work until the customers return.
I did my first tree removal today in a new venture with two other guys. We started a tree service and have other jobs to do.
We'll see if this can give us a shot in the arm to hold us over until our regular businesses come back to normal.
There's a lot of tree work here and I'll use any excuse to get in the trees, even if I have to make money at it.