Alger's Mercy Mission, Final Chapter

Note from Mayor Sam: Readers of the Sister City know we followed Northridge West Neighborhood Council President and Assembly candidate Jim Alger while he flew his own plane on a mission of mercy to help those in the Gulf Coast affected by Hurricane Katrina. Here is the final part of Jim's story in his own words.

So when I last left off, we had just gotten the civillian airlift operatin into high gear. Ferrying supplies in and evacuees out of the hurricane ravaged area of Biloxi, MS. I had been coordinating with a local City Councilman to get the supplies in so imagine my supprise when I received a call from the Councilman telling me that nothing had gotten through.

The rest of what happened was previously posted but I will repeat it here.

Yesterday morning we coordinated two large busses filled with materials and supplies and sent them down to Bill. Once again they were diverted except this time I was called by the drivers. I took a local news crew and some volunteers and flew to Gulfport Mississippi. At 5:30 pm local time, we pulled past the roadblocks and into Yankee statium in Biloxi. Bill finally got supplies he had asked for. They were desperately in need of building supplies, and still are. Entire neighborhoods are simply gone. The smell of death wass hauntingly in the air, and the American Red Cross wass nowhere to be found.

The CBS news crew that I flew down from Knoxville, Tennesee will later aired stories the next week and helped shine a light on the situation in Mississippi, which was desperate to say the least.

We have successfully evacuated countless people by air and land. So much so that the busses left with only two passengers, a mom and a five year old girl who were trapped in the city (pictured above)