Unprecedented Year of Natural Disasters Creates Untold Need
The harsh realities of the seemingly increasing weather events in the U.S. and around the world has coincided with Hope Force International’s (HFI) thrust of regionalizing operations. The pandemic reinforced our strategy of increasing our presence in strategic areas of the United States in order to decrease our response time for assessments and mobilization of our HFI Reservists. Year 2020 brought with it 22 weather disasters that produced damage — amounting in a billion dollars or more in relief efforts per incident. This shattered the previous one-year record of 16, held by the years 2011 and 2017. These 22 disaster events saw a response effort of $95 billion dollars — with Hurricane Laura itself requiring $19 billion. Even though these statistics are difficult to fathom on their own, maybe the most troublesome is that in 2020, only the months of June and December escaped one of these billion dollar events. Even more staggering is the reality that 20 of these events happened east of the Rockies.
From the inception of Hope Force International, we knew that we would eventually regionalize operations. Over the past two years, we have realized some of the expansion that was originally envisioned. Joey Stolzfus, Director of Disaster Services, moved to South Carolina — enabling HFI to quickly address disasters in the southeast part of our country. In July 2020, HFI staffer, Brian Wagner, moved to the heart of “Tornado Alley” in Oklahoma in order to oversee that division — decreasing response time to disasters occurring in the Midwest and central plain states.
To the extent that the past can help predict the future, we anticipate that natural calamities will continue to impact the lives of people in the days ahead. While we may not know when or where, it is a virtual certainty that our world will experience tornadic activity, floods, hurricanes, earthquakes and other calamities somewhere in this coming year. The need to be prepared and poised to respond requires constant vigilance in order to mount a rapid response. Thanks to our dedicated, capable staff and volunteers, we stand ready and willing to respond to the need as required.
Something about rebuilding programs and how you can take part in them.
Haiti’s earthquake galvanized the world to reach out to a nation suffering from untold destruction.
Hope Force is committed to serving not just in the immediate aftermath of a disaster, but we engage in the relief and rebuild phases as well. January 10-17 a group of Hope Force volunteers and Reservists participated in an important rebuild project in Texas.
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Mr. McDaniel’s neighborhood was devastated by the Nashville March tornado. Hope Force mounted an effective relief effort with a focus on placing tarps on damaged roofs. Mr. McDaniel’s home was severely impacted — his roof was virtually destroyed.
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Lake Charles, LA was devastated by Hurricane Laura, and the damage was overwhelming. As if this weren’t enough, a few weeks later, Hurricane Delta struck another blow to this already beleaguered community.
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