EAST ORANGE, Texas – Today was another great day; however, one house had its challenges. Gerald’s home was built around the 1930s and has been passed on throughout the generations. As teams measured and hung drywall, they quickly realized that the home was not square level or plumbed correctly. (more…)

BEAUMONT, Texas – Today was an exciting day as we welcomed 108 Rockford Master’s Commission (RMC) students. They arrived at 10:00 AM in 12 vans, excited to take part in our week of “Extreme Blessing” home make-overs. (more…)

OAK ISLAND, Texas – We went to Oak Island on Saturday after hearing that there were several hundred familes in a Vietnamese fishing community that had not received hardly any help. (more…)

BRIDGE CITY, Texas – Today we helped a very precious family in need. Richard and his wife, Angie, have two children: Cameron, 11, and a teenage daughter, Kelsey. They evacuated for Hurricane Ike and returned to find their home flooded with over 2 feet of water. (more…)

BRIDGE CITY, Texas – Today was a great day overall. We worked on cleaning up Deputy Sheriff Mike’s house today. When Ike came ashore, Deputy Mike and his fellow officers were staying in a secure bunker to weather the storm. But as the 911 calls poured in from terrified residents, they left the safety of the bunker in boats and off-road dump trucks to rescue people who otherwise may have lost their lives. (more…)

ORANGE, Texas – Today I stopped by to check on a crew of volunteers. As I drove up the the street to the home where they were working on, I passed a cemetary and saw caskets that had literally popped out of the graves. Ike’s storm surge saturated the ground so much that the caskets were uprooted from their cement graves and scattered throughout the small cemetery. (more…)

Beaumont, Texas – Yesterday was a great day. We received free fuel at the fuel depot set up by the state to supply fuel to first responders, state officials and disaster relief agencies. The need for fuel, however, is still creating long lines at the pump. (more…)

DALLAS – As Texas braces for a heavy hit from Hurricane Ike, our disaster relief teams are ready to launch an immediate response within hours after the storm. (more…)

HATTIESBURG, Miss. – I arrived with three of my senior staff to Hattiesburg, Mississippi around 8:30 p.m. and we drove the Hattiesburg Salvation Army Corps buildings where we met up with our National Reserve Staff and equipment.

Today was a day of mixed emotions as I received phone calls from pastors and friends as they evacuated New Orleans.  These calls were from very strong and resilient people, but you could hear the fear in their voices.  Many of them just completed restoring their homes from Katrina and, after 3 years, were beginning to experience “normalcy.”  Now, as they drove along interstates, their hearts were gripped with the flashback and memories of everything they have worked for being washed away.
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Today marked a monumental day as Operation Blessing and The Home Depot embarked on their first ever disaster relief partnership. More than 125 Home Depot associates from 28 stores within Missouri and Illinois arrived at the Operation Blessing Mobile Command Center in Winfield, Missouri, to help clean up the devastation left behind by the floods. (more…)