Addressing the Houston Devastation
Hey everybody. So I’m gonna give some people a little bit of time to get on tonight. I’m not really gonna do kind of my normal rant, if you will, or major talk about anything specific, other than kind of going along the lines of what’s happening in Houston right now. Let’s see who the viewers are.
I’ve got a special guest that’s going to be joining me tonight. This guy’s actually a friend who actually lives in Houston, is in Houston right now. And I kind of wanted to get to figure out who is … Get you some information from someone’s who’s actually on the ground there and dealing with what’s going on. If I can get this thing to work where I can actually see who’s on here.
Want me to pull it up in our thing?
I’ve got the live viewers, Justin. It’s just not letting me see them all.
That’s not going to do it either. Yeah, what the …
Oh, there it is. We had it again.
There we go.
There we go. So we’re going to [inaudible 00:01:22] this will work. Do this on a different page. On the dummy page I got it to work right away, so hopefully I don’t.
Hey.
Josh is here. Hey buddy.
Hey. It looks like the best way to … Every time I do this, it looks like you have to comment and then it will split screen it.
Will it really?
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Okay. Very cool. Well …
So that might be why it wasn’t working last time.
Well, you know what, thank you guys. Thanks Josh. So everybody, this is Josh [inaudible 00:01:53]. Josh is down in a suburb of Houston, correct?
And so I wanted to get Josh on here, number one just because he’s a cool dude, and I kind of like talking to him every now and then, and he’s kind of the epitome of what this whole Man Up Project really is. I also wanted him on here to … I don’t know if this is really a public service type of deal, but I wanted people to kind of get an idea of what’s going on there, Josh, from you as far as like the scale of this.
I mean, we see it on the TV, we see it in the news. I remember the first time Brenda and I went to Paris, we actually got to see the Eiffel Tower in person. And [inaudible 00:02:34] in pictures, and actually to see it in person is like, “Oh my word. This thing’s huge.” And so [inaudible 00:02:40] people even have a clue as to what it’s like down there as of right now.
So right now, it’s very crazy. Lots of rain. If you are familiar with the Houston area, you know that there are a lot of lakes, and rivers, and creeks, and bayous, and it is a low area. They built it basically concrete on top of a bayou. So with the amount of rain totals here, the flood is just beginning to become outrageous and catastrophic.
If you have not been watching on the news, some places have been getting upwards of 40 inches of rain, which is just unbelievable amount of rain. And many of the lakes and the reservoirs are beginning to crest, and they are all cresting. All the creeks, all the bayous, all the lakes, all the rivers, they’re all cresting at record levels. And they have just now begun their cresting, and they’re gonna get higher as the days go on.
Many of the lakes are just beyond capacity. So because they’re beyond capacity, they are having to let the water out slowly, so that they can continue to control the dams, so that they can secure the integrity of the dams. And because of that, they are having voluntary and mandatory evacuations down stream, because the amount of water that is coming into these lakes is exceeding the amount that is actually being able to let out.
So in the next coming days, the flooding id going to be a lot worse than it actually Is right now. And the storm is supposed to be here for another three or four days. Which is going to add another five to ten inches of rain each of those days, on top of what’s already been done.
Would you say this had been Katrina levels, if not worse than Katrina levels?
It could possibly be worse, because it’s going to span basically from Corpus Christi, and now they’re saying that a lot of this is going to start hitting Louisiana as well. So it’s going to be basically the coast of Texas and the coast of Louisiana.
Holy smokes.
So it’s gonna be a … again, it’s a catastrophic situation right now.
We look at you, and we can see behind you, you guys got power, and you’re still in a house, and-
Yeah, we were blessed. It did flicker a lot all night last night, but it’s on and running right now, so …
But that’s not the case for a lot of the neighborhoods down there, is it?
I think there’s like 130-150 thousand people without power right now. It has been amazing that there are homes underwater, yet there is still power in a lot of the homes. It’s kind of the craziest thing. But a lot oof these communities are going to the underground wire now, instead of the poles, so …
I’m assuming because the weather’s been crappy, that there hasn’t been a lot of, society at it’s worst. What happens when sometimes when these types of things happen, you’ll see the looters and those types of things come out. Have you seen much of that?
They actually haven’t seen as much as you would think. They really haven’t even talked about it at all on the major news channels here, the local ones. The main thing is people have been actually been getting out there and helping people get out of their homes, because places that were not supposed to flood, and were supposedly high and dry, are now flooding. And, again like I said, the waters are going to continue to rise, so people are getting their boats and they are helping out as much as they can.
I saw a video today in Dickinson, which has just been issued a mandatory evacuation, it’s completely underwater, and again it’s gonna get higher. And the streets are full of boats, and people walking the boats around helping people get to safety so that they can be brought to a shelter. It’s a pretty amazing thing that men and women are stepping up and doing what they can to help their fellow man. And it’s amazing to see people doing what we’re called to do, and that’s to love and help people.
[inaudible 00:07:59] on that. That’s what struck me about the [inaudible 00:08:02], talking to you and I think [Cory Sorez 00:08:05], I mean he’s another guy that we know in our business, and I know he drove his truck and boat down there, and he’s down there doing what he can to help. And the reason I wanted to do this today on this page, is because the whole Man Up Project that I’ve kind of started with the everything, that’s what it is. It’s looking for those that need help that can’t help themselves, or not that they can’t help themselves, but in this case, it’s so devastating that they can’t because everything is gone.
Yes, exactly.
And so to see that [inaudible 00:08:46], in a situation like this there’s more-
I’m still here.
… more people doing the right thing, than the bad thing. More people manning up, and human up, human-ing? Is human-ing a word? I don’t know if it’s a word. But stepping up and being that [inaudible 00:09:14].
I’m sorry, I lost you for that last thing there.
… that people are actually doing that, and they’re stepping in. Like, what the heck is it, the Cajun Navy?
Cajun Navy, they came in in force, and they said that, “Y’all helped.” Houston sent a lot of people with their boats to help them during Katrina, so they wanted to help Texas while we’re going through the same kind of thing as they were going through. So, helping their neighbor.
Yeah, and that’s cool. For those of you who don’t know, the Cajun Navy is, I believe, correct me if I’m wrong, Josh, but I think it’s a bunch of former vets that kind of started it, and they’re search and rescue, and they know what they’re doing, and they’re retired. And it’s something that they can give back and help their fellow [inaudible 00:10:02]. They go from disaster to disaster-
They do, it’s an amazing sight to see, all Lined up on the road driving down there.
Yeah, so that’s really cool. So, Josh, I know there’s a lot of people like me, “Okay, I’m all the way up in Minnesota. I can’t really do anything from here, I can put a prayer up, but other than that … ” What’s the best way people can help? [inaudible 00:10:36] Unless you get boat right now, not much you can do down there. Looking forward into the future, people always wonder, “Okay, if I’m gonna give money to something, or someone, or some organization, how do I know that my money is gonna actually make it to the people who need it?” [inaudible 00:10:58] The Red Cross, which I think, that’s a great organization to help too. For you guys that are there, and what you know, and where the help is needed, what can we tell people, what can people know?
Well, of course American Red Cross that’s just kind of a go to that most people do, like you said. The Southern Baptist Disaster Relief is also a big one here. I know they helped out a lot during a lot of the hurricanes. Samaritan’s Purse. And then one that’s close to my heart is Iconnect Outreach, which is actually a foundation that my dad started during Hurricane Ike, and it’s one where they were able to amass about 8 thousand volunteers, and rebuild over 100 homes, and several schools and churches in the aftermath of Hurricane Ike, and they have revamped that for Hurricane Harvey. And so if you wanna donate, you can go to IconnectOutreach.org, there’s also a GoFundMe for the same thing that is GoFundMe.com/hurricane-harvey-emergency-helping. I know that was long, but I think that’s how GoFundMe does it.
Josh, what I’d like to do then, when we finish this up, if you wouldn’t mind in the comments putting down [inaudible 00:12:44], those things that you listed off so people can kind of have an idea of, “Okay, here’s what I can do to help.” Because I think where the big help is gonna be needed is once this is all done. [inaudible 00:13:07] the rebuilding process.
A lot of rebuilding, my gosh. It’s gonna be unbelievable. I mean the homes are just so inundated with water. It’s gonna be an ordeal for a long time.
I think you’re exactly right. So I think once … and I’ll keep in touch with you as things go, and once this is done and that rebuilding process starts, I’d like to do another video and if people want to go down and help, what’s the process look like, how does that look, and so we can get anybody that wants to, a way to be able to get down there and help, if that’s what they want to do. If you’re up for that.
I’m up for that, if you’re up for that.
100%. Well, Josh, I appreciate you being on here with me tonight, and you guys are still in our prayers and our thoughts, all of that. That whole part of the country is.
Appreciate it.
And you guys stay safe, stay dry. Hopefully your electricity stays on.
I hope so.
[inaudible 00:14:15] you just reach out and give a holler, but really appreciate you stopping by and kind of just giving everybody a real life lesson on what that manning up piece is. I’ve said it before, it could be called human up, but at this point I wrote the book, so I’m calling it man up. It encompasses everybody, but [inaudible 00:14:43] right now, really kind of embodying what that means. And I hate to see that it takes something like this to really highlight it, but man, you guys are really stepping up [inaudible 00:14:55] that area, and the whole country is, and if there’s anything we can do, let us know.
Appreciate it. Thanks for having me on.
You bet. You have a good rest of the evening, and say hi to the family for me, and give everybody a hug when you see them.
Will do. Thank you, man. Love you, brother.
Take care.