Mennonite Central Committee

Floyd and Mary Landis, Indian Valley Trucking, Souderton, Pennsylvania.

Indian Valley Trucking tractor trailer pulls out of the warehouse parking lot.

Four truckloads of emergency supplies go to Alabama

September 5, 2005

AKRON, Pa. — At the request of Mennonite Disaster Service (MDS) four truckloads of Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) emergency relief supplies were shipped from the MCC warehouse in Ephrata, Pa. over the weekend to Alabama for distribution in the coastal town of Bayou La Batre, south of Mobile.

The supplies included 800 cartons (24 cans per carton) of canned turkey, more than 2,000 relief kits, 10,000 comforters and blankets, 5,000 school kits and 5,000 health kits. According Kevin King, executive director of MDS, the aid is going to a community that has been "forgotten."

"Nobody knows about us," Bayou La Batre mayor Stan Wright told King on Saturday. "We are forgotten here."

The town and surrounding community includes nearly 20,000 people and is primarily a fishing community near the Mississippi Sound. Hurricane Katrina is the fourth hurricane to hit the community in the past year. Last year they experienced the wrath of hurricanes Ivan, Cindy, and Dennis, King said.

The MCC trucks were loaded Saturday evening and arrived in Bayou La Batre late Monday afternoon. The distribution of supplies began Tuesday and was being handled by MDS and local volunteers.