Please FORWARD to your town newspaper, your church, your contacts...
Go West!
A small Texas town sets a shining example for us all in times of trouble
by Michael Tummillo
Now, imagine them all destroyed in a moment of terror. Obliterated. Wiped off the map. Charred, fragmented, smoldering in pieces everywhere you look. To add to this disastrous scene, dozens upon dozens of people have been either killed, wounded, or became instantly unemployed when the place they worked disintegrated and they now face very few local opportunities to either work or relocate.
Sad.
What you've just envisioned is exactly what's happened to West, Texas. I'm a Workplace Chaplain for Ekklesia HealthCare in Whitney. Texas. As a Volunteer Chaplain with the Austin Disaster Relief Network (ADRN) - 3,000 Volunteers from 112 different churches in the Austin area - I've just spent the past three days in West, attempting to assist survivors of the recent explosion in taking a small bite out of the horrible elephant they're all trying to eat. It seems insurmountable. Many folks are in a zombie-like state. Others are quite emotional. Some seem hopeless, even suicidal. Still others are hiding behind a mask of positivity and even faith. Truth is, nobody comes through a disaster of this kind completely unscathed.
The injuries! I have seen people with swollen eyes and bruises, burns and cuts, arms in slings, eye patches and bandages where pieces of glass were removed. Some had deep bloody pits where, apparently, something had become embedded in their skin. Today, I saw a woman with stitches running down the side of her face, right through the center of her ear into her cheek. One grandmother showed me a cell phone photo of her 2-year old grandbaby, before and after. In the first picture, there was an adorable baby girl with curly brown hair. In the next, there she was, head shaved, face scraped horribly, glass in her eyes, her skull fractured. The stories kept coming and coming.
I saw grown men weep uncontrollably. I've heard tearful descriptions of bloodied body parts in the street. I listened as my very first encounter was with a grandmother who cried as she described naked children lying dead in the street while she fought with the blinding black smoke in an effort to breathe. A television was forced into the sheetrock on the wall behind it. A sad, 6-year old boy was in the hallway which was all that was left standing after the blast. Though his house was gone, all he could say was, "I lost all my stuff."
There were miracles, too. Folks were thrilled to share what God had done to spare them. A car positioned just right, deflecting the incoming debris. A dream warning an old woman the night before. A man in his yard, talking on his cell phone, moved just in time to miss the blast.
Please pray for the people who lost a loved one. The whole town is so sad and grieving. Please pray for those who saw things no one should ever have to see. Please pray for the local churches as all its ministers attempt to offer prayer and counseling. Please pray for the Volunteers, too. On the ADRN team alone, folks were spending money on gas and hotels and slept in cars. I drove 90 minutes each way myself and got hopelessly lost coming home that first night. Ugh! Maybe I was just too preoccupied with my thoughts. Tired, too. Today, due to cold and windy weather, those reaching out for assistance were considerably fewer. Remember, it was warm when the explosion took place and many had no winter clothes after they left their homes. Those who have been allowed back home are being told not to eat anything or wear anything because of the ammonium nitrate all over everything. Great! How are they supposed to job hunt without looking presentable?
I couldn't help but notice how few were prepared for this incident. A simple Bug-out Bag in the trunk filled with a 3-day supply of food, water and some warm clothes would have been a blessing to many. Instead, far too many would up standing in line and at the mercy of relief agencies and FEMA (who had not shown up since the explosion until I left at 4:30 this afternoon. So much for government assistance). A little self-reliance can be a really good thing. If any group would be interested in receiving some "prepping" assistance, I do those presentations all the time.
Well-meaning folks keep asking me about donating clothes, food, even blood as well as their time. Thanks, but what West really needs is money. Folks need to get a nice outfit for job interviews, have their hair done, fill their car so they can travel to interviews and get to that new job, and the funds to pay for the hotel they wound up staying in with their kids. Walmart and HEB gift cards are the hottest tickets being distributed by Volunteers in West. We kept running out ourselves at the ADRN station. You can make a donation payable to ADRN, P.O, Box 3817, Cedar Park, TX 78630 ATTN: West, Texas Disaster Fund or go to ADRNTX.org. You can donate at SalvationArmy.com, too. Actually, there are quite a few places to donate.
While some in the vicinity are offering rooms in their own homes on a limited basis, others are renting a block of rooms at area hotels and paying for so many nights. Once that is made known, word spreads like wildfire. Those interested in that kind of a contribution need only tell me at miketummillo@me.com; I'll spread the word immediately!
Count your blessings next time you pray. Ask the Lord what you can do to offer the greatest amount of help to the greatest number of people. Give thanks for your job, your peaceful community, your healthy loved ones, too.
West, Texas exhibited a shining example of a community coming together in troubled times. I was impressed as I had never witnessed anything like that. The strength and resolve shown by most of the people I was privileged to talk to was inspiring, especially those who were in the nursing home that was destroyed. That staff - now unemployed - were gathering daily while we were there and were clinging to, loving and supporting one another. They expressed such deep love and concern for their Residents, too, now dispersed to nursing homes in other communities, including one of the nursing homes I serve in Whitney called Park Plaza where, as I can attest, they'll receive excellent care. One employee, now jobless, proudly shared how methodically her coworkers moved to rescue anyone whose lives were in peril, as if it were a well-rehearsed drill. Her eyes welled-up with tears as she shared about a woman with blood pouring from her head who went about assisting others despite her wound.
The end of the world as you know it doesn't have to be the result of some hellish explosion. For some, it could be the death of a child, divorce papers served, a pregnant teen, a son arrested for drug possession, the loss of a job, or a bad report from the doctor. My prayer for everyone reading this now, is that, if anything horrible ever happens to you, your community would rally and support you in the same way West, Texas - and ALL their surrounding communities - have come together the past few days. What I have been blessed to behold was truly a thing of beauty never to be forgotten.
This just in: Though my phone is ringing today from folks wanting to render assistance and the email's are pouring in with offers of homes and jobs, among those messages has just come this one: "The Abbott Volunteer Fire Department is a first responder unit and has 17 members. It was on the scene of the disaster in a few minutes. Members of our department were lost in the explosion. This is a tremendous loss.
A fund has been set up for the AVFD at:
First National Bank of Central Texas
300 East Elm Street
Hillsboro TX 76645
254-582-5365
Please note on the check: Benefit of the AVFD.
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