Kentucky the Disaster Area: Update

My friend in Graves County, Kentucky, has been trying to keep in touch and let me know how things are going for her.

We started with days of storms, no power, no heat, no nothing.  A county of sixty thousand without power.  The National Guard is there.  Shelters are set up but there’s no power or water.  People are apparently dying.  It’s still freezing and raining or snowing or sleeting.

Where is the press?  Why are we not hearing about this on the news?

Allow me to quote from today’s update email:

We get most of our electricity through a hydroelectric service called the Tennessee Valley
Authority, and two of their six sub-stations are completely broken. One main transmitter, as a newsman called it, blew as well, and we’re waiting on a tower of some sort to be delivered by helicopter. We will be without heat or electricity for at least five more days, and since this is a very rural area, some might be without for over a month.

Ok, let me do a fact check.  It’s 2009.  In the continental United States (even if it’s Kentucky).  We cannot get power or heat and supplies to various counties?  Even with the National Guard?  Graves County has a population of about sixty thousand people.

There are no Iraqi militants to duck.  No Improvised Explosive Devices.  No second rate contractors with third rate equipment to endure.  Blackwater is not around to shoot the residents; it’s just a description of the only water they can find.  Zero sand.  Ok, there’s a language barrier, but it can be overcome.  The only thing they need liberation from is the cold.

Where is the press?  Why are we not hearing about this on the news?

Why can’t we get some bit of normalcy restored to Kentucky?

Here are some more bits about what’s happening:
In one area hospital, people have died because the generators ran out of fuel, and some oxygen equipment powered off. We were out of water from late Wednesday through yesterday. Fortunately, those problems have been taken care of for now. FEMA sent 80 generators to a nearby army base, and those were put in place over this past night. Emergency and other essential services are being powered through those.

The news gets more interesting (and better):

300K people in West KY alone are still out of electricity. Many are also unable to get meds or any sort of healthcare, because most clinics and pharmacies are closed. The mail isn’t even running! We do have quite alot of federal assistance, though, and crews have come in from several other states to help with the repairs. Pres. Obama signed some sort of executive order and help actually arrived much quicker than I expected.

Thankfully.

Keep them in your thoughts.

Please keep our communities in your thoughts, and ask others to do the same.  Thousands of people are still in shelters, and many of those are also low on supplies. From what I’ve heard, we haven’t had alot of national news coverage.  Not sure what worked out with that. Based on the lack of news and the fact that the term ‘winter storm’ doesn’t do justice to what’s happened here, I’m guessing the general public has no idea how badly the area was affected. From in the midst of it, though, it’s absolutely appalling.

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Maybe I’m just not looking at this the right way.  Perhaps I should just go ahead and list the Reasons Why No Rescue is Possible in Kentucky:

• no families named Obama
• only coal - no oil in Kentucky
• the only Oppressive Regime there is the weather
• potential rescuers are gun-shy after Katrina
• no one takes Kentucky seriously anyway
• most of them don’t have electricity to lose!
• wuz dem COWS walkin down thuh street?
• the last time there was this much excitement, Bubba Johnson rode his lawn tractor down the street, drunk.
• too busy bailing out financial institutions (and everyone else) to worry about citizens
• where’s Kentucky?