Commentary by Ward Degler
Our first response was prayers for friends and family in Houston. My wife was on the phone whenever she could get through. We watched the devastation on television.
Later we heard about courageous acts. Mothers carrying children on their shoulders through chin-deep water. A man from high, dry ground hauling his boat halfway across the state to put it to work in flood waters. Three teenage boys borrowing their parents’ small fishing boat and rescuing 50 men, women, children and pets. First responders working around the clock, surviving on crackers and sleeping in five-minute naps.
So far the death toll has been small. Unlike Hurricane Katrina, where medical crews explored house after flooded house on a mission of rescue, only to spray paint numbers and letters on the roof denoting the dead within.
Every hurricane is deadly and indescribably destructive. Strangely, Harvey subsided to tropical storm status shortly after reaching shore. And then it sat there inundating the land with rain. As much as 50 to 60 inches in less than three days.
It’s hard to fathom that kind of rain. It comes down so hard it’s difficult to breathe and almost impossible to see. Roads, sidewalks, parking lots and back yards instantly become one giant lake.
And if there are tropical storm winds – 40-60 mph – the lake and the rain are whipped into a froth that can carry you away without warning. Flooding is instantaneous. As streams and rivers overflow their banks, 50 inches of rain becomes 50 feet of water.
My first tour in the Navy was aboard a World War II destroyer in the Pacific. We spent 10 days in the South China Sea riding out a typhoon. We clocked winds at 90 mph across the deck. Waves as tall as office buildings smashed portholes and hatches on the ship.
When we finally limped into port we had one sailor with a broken leg, two others with broken arms, plus several concussions. No one on the ship had eaten for days and no one could remember the last time he slept. The wind and the water had blasted away most of the ship’s paint.
The scene ashore was worse. Entire buildings on the naval base had blown away. Cars, trucks and even a bulldozer wound up in the water 100 yards away from shore. Tired as we were, every crew member that could walk eagerly pitched in to help set up emergency services.
We survived, of course, and so will the victims of Harvey. Especially with the brand of courage we have already seen.
