Operating on little sleep and a great desire to help, a large group of St. Charles Parish residents assembled at the West Bank Bridge Park Monday morning before helping rescue flood victims from record flooding in Louisiana.
It was the third day these volunteers were using their boats to rescue hundreds of people in badly flooded neighborhoods, including Baton Rouge, St. Amant and Denham Springs, among others. They began Saturday morning with Luling’s Raymond Guedry with an estimated eight to 10 boats and 16 people.
Just how grave the situation was became clear to them once they reached the Monticello subdivision in East Baton Rouge on the group’s first day there.
“It was the Monticello subdivision versus the water,” Guedry said. “We probably moved about 250 people out of that neighborhood. Those people woke up with two feet of water in their homes. In the next three to five hours we were there, the water rose another three to five feet. It was up to the rooftops.”
Rescuers quickly realized their job wasn’t finished.
“We said we need to come back,” Guedry said. “By the time we left, we probably had about 40 boats. And (Monday) it was about 30 boats leaving the bridge park.”
Little came easily to them in these affected areas, but they couldn’t leave people without help. The neighborhoods were unfamiliar and the group had to rely on Facebook to find many of those in need of rescue, utilizing the Cajun Navy page on the site as a hub for people asking for help.
“It was very disheartening at times,” Guedry said. “We were getting direct messages, cell phone numbers from people asking to be rescued. We were trying to be as effective as we possibly could be, but nobody was telling us how to help. I was flying blind. I don’t think the government agencies really knew how to organize the civilian resources at their disposal or use them efficiently. Nobody could really tell us where to go.
“The devastation was tremendous. It was absolutely horrible. I keep telling myself we did everything we could do,” Guedry added.
Craig Perrier, another rescuer and Destrehan High School teacher, described a scene with plenty of high water and emotional fallout.
“There were a lot of people crying. Everything was underwater,” Perrier said. “Things are pretty bad in some areas. In St. Amant, a guy was cutting his grass one day and then his house is in six or seven feet of water the next. It’s bad and getting worse there. We went over the top of a few mailboxes.”
Guedry said their distress is far from over because many of these residents don’t have flood insurance.
Others simply weren’t mentally prepared for the aftermath of such a situation.
“We had people coming out with flip-flops, their medication in a bag and they think they’re ready to go,” Guedry said. “They don’t always realize, ‘Hey, you’re not coming back here for at least a week.’”
Perrier said a number of people in less affected areas didn’t want to leave at all.
“A lot of them wanted to stay,” he said. “We gave them water, some food and did what we could to help.”Both men praised their fellow rescuers for their selflessness and effectiveness.
“We had an unbelievable group of guys,” Guedry said. “We sent out one message and we didn’t have to ask twice … 30 boats, 60 guys show up. No questions asked. There was no bickering, no arguing.”
Perrier concurred.
“I didn’t know half of these guys, but everyone pulled together,” Perrier said, noting Monday those in the rescue group were working on very limited sleep. “These St. Charles Parish boys are ready to do anything, anytime for any cause. They’ll go to the danger. At times, the water kept rising and rising and it looked like you were whitewater rafting.”
In addition, several St. Charles Parish deputies volunteered their help to the affected parishes and the St. Charles Parish Sheriff’s Office sent all of their high-water vehicles to assist.
Guedry added local do-gooders knew they had a special capability to help through experiences those from few other areas could match.
“I think a lot of it was we knew we had the capabilities to help with our boats, and really it came down to the idea that ‘if we don’t do it, who will?’” Guedry said. “And you’d like to hope that if we needed it, someone would come and get us. Living in St. Charles Parish, we deal with high water, flooding, and we have the infrastructure to do it. They really don’t have that.”
Perrier noted that St. Charles Parish was “very, very lucky” to be spared from the torrential rainfall.
“Otherwise, we wouldn’t have had to go too far to do what we’re doing,” Perrier said.
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