“And there arose a great storm of wind . . . .”
(Mark 4:37)
By God’s grace, we survived Hurricane Melissa!
“This will be the hurricane of the century!” one meteorologist said. “This might be the first hurricane to be considered a Category 6,” another said. Whether or not both of these statements were true, one thing I can certainly say, “Melissa was a monster of a hurricane, one like we have never experienced before!”
About a week before she came, we were alerted to her brewing in our waters. We were warned that she was taking it nice and slow and that she was going to be dangerous as she stewed in the unusually warm Caribbean Sea.
By Friday, all stores were basically sold out of hurricane-preparation necessities. We were able to snag a few for some of the people in our church and community and for ourselves. We spent most of the day on Friday and Saturday helping folks prepare by distributing supplies, securing houses, and helping with evacuations. After our Sunday morning service the next day, we boarded up the church building. On Monday, we secured our apartment and assisted some of our neighbors in doing the same.
Then she came. For the first eight hours, we had light rain and wind; then things slowly intensified. About 3:00 Tuesday morning, the power got knocked out. By about 1:00 in the afternoon, Melissa started churning through our neighborhood, thrashing on our doors and windows, peeling off roofs, flooding homes, shredding trees, and banging on cars. We prayed for her to hurry and skedaddle, but she took her own sweet time. After about six hours of pounding on us, Melissa skipped across the ocean to her next victim, leaving us to deal with the aftermath. Our family survived with just some flooding, but that is minor in comparison to what others have faced.
By daybreak on Wednesday, everyone was busy with the cleanup. Neighbors pitched in and helped each other out. Once we were done and heard that the roads were passable, we took the eight-minute trip to visit our church folks—it actually took us over an hour. We spent the rest of the day visiting, encouraging, and praying with folks in the community. It was absolutely devastating! So many people lost so much! So many houses and properties were damaged and destroyed. Infrastructure, such as roads, power lines, and water-supply pipes, is all gone. There was an incredible amount of flooding. It will take months to recover from all of the damages. All of our church folks are accounted for, but none of them were left unscathed. Melissa was the deadliest hurricane in our recorded history.
With the electrical infrastructure being out, it will only be a short while before the backup batteries in our cell towers will be out of power also. Then our modern ways of communication will also be gone.
More than anything, we need a lot of prayer! If the Lord has burdened your heart to be a blessing to our ministry, here are some basic needs we have:
• Nonperishable food items
• Vitamin C
• Portable water filters
• Clothing
• Air mattresses
• Bed sheets
• Starlink internet systems
• Generators
• Power inverters
• USB power banks
• Solar-powered anything (fans, lights, power banks, panels, battery backups, etc.)
• Reconstruction supplies (chainsaws, roof sheeting, lumber, plywood, etc.)
• Construction teams
It would make sense for us to source some of these items locally, but some would be better imported.
Thank you and may our Lord continue to bless you.
THE ANDERSON FAMILY
Oral, Alicia, Daniel, David, Joshua, Alaina, & Ashley
