If Hurricane Katrina had never struck the Gulf Coast, Norm Andrzejewski dreads to think what would have become of him.
“I’d be dead,” he said bluntly. “That may be overstating it a bit, but I’ve had my share of health problems. I’ve got six kids and 12 grandkids, and they keep you going, but this…this is different. This has been my salvation.”
While the storm killed hundreds and caused billions in damages, it also offered Andrzejewski the opportunity to do something we all hope to do: change the world.
The storm
Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast on Aug. 29, 2005. The storm alone killed 1,200 people; several hundred more died because they couldn’t get medical care during or after the storm or suffered stress-related heart attacks, raising Katrina’s death toll to more than 1,800. The economic impact stands at about $108 billion.
An unusually devastating storm, Katrina measured about 400 miles across when it made landfall in Louisiana. The storm surges were the highest ever recorded, as high as 34 feet above average level. Katrina wiped entire towns off the map, swallowing whole the communities of Waveland, Bay St. Louis, Long Beach and Pass Christian, among others.
The hurricane also struck during one of the worst hurricane seasons on record; Katrina was one of four major hurricanes in 2005, joining Dennis, Rita and Wilma to cause a total of $150 billion in damages across the United States. There were so many storms that season that the National Weather Service exhausted the planned alphabetical roster of names; hurricane watchers turned to letters of the Greek alphabet. The final storm of the season, which continued to seethe in the Atlantic into January of 2006, was named Zeta.
It was into this devastation that Andrzejewski and his crew of volunteers waded in the fading months of 2005.
Lives on the curb
Just after the storm, Andrzejewski, a Tulane graduate, spoke to a friend, Donlene Butler, to find out if she was okay.
“She didn’t know anything,” he said. “She didn’t know where anyone was. It didn’t make sense to do anything at that point.”
Andrzejewski talked to Butler again a month later. She’d located most of her family and made it back to her house in Belle Chasse, La., only to find it flooded with 12 feet of water, most of her belongings ruined.
“I said, ‘Well, I have to do something,’” Andrzejewski said. “I could send a check, but I didn’t want to. I wanted to do something more tangible. So I said to Donlene, ‘What if I came down for a week and brought six people with me?’”
Andrzejewski ended up bringing 14 people with him. After spending five days cleaning up, the group headed home, determined to return.
Out of that determination, Operation Southern Comfort (OSC) was born. The group became a mission of St. Joseph the Worker Church in Liverpool, which affords it nonprofit status and the ability to get tax-deductible contributions and administrative support. Since that first trip, OSC has made more than 40 trips to the Gulf Coast. All trips are funded by traveler contributions; each volunteer is asked to pay $280 for their own expenses, room and board. Local contributions pay for construction materials. Volunteers have worked on personal homes, churches, community facilities and public parks. OSC participants have also planted trees in the area in an effort to lessen the impact of any future storms.
Dick Hollington, now a board member for OSC, was among one of the first groups to head down to the Gulf to help with cleanup.
“It was a lot of mucking out and cleaning out. You realize that you’re taking people’s lives and putting them on the curb,” Hollington said. “You can replace a lot of it. A lot of it’s just stuff. But there’s also personal effects you can’t get back and have to throw out. That hit me after a while, that it was people that lived there.”
Dick Bonnano, another board member, joined the effort later, in 2011, after much of the original cleanup had already taken place. But he still saw the devastation wrought by the storm.
“There were still a lot of people in very serious need,” Bonnano said. “The first project I worked on was in the Ninth Ward, and what struck me was that half of the homes in one neighborhood were just gone. Another quarter were abandoned. The last quarter were people trying to put their lives back together. It had a profound effect on me.”
OSC tasks itself with working with that last group — those trying to put their lives back together. Groups typically go down for a week, leaving on a Saturday and driving through the weekend. Work begins Monday morning, assuming everything’s where it’s supposed to be — all of the materials are in place, the homeowner is present, everyone can get into the property, etc. Once all of the kinks are ironed out, the team works through the week, with a night out on the town on Wednesday. On Friday, the volunteers finish up, then hold a candlelight service that night, which Andrzejewski said is his favorite part.
“Go get the Kleenex for that one,” he said. “About 50 percent of the people who show up will testify about something, and we’ll ride the high from that all the way home. That never goes away.”
‘We’re hooked’
It’s that feeling that keeps hundreds of people from a town 1,500 miles away going back to the Gulf Coast.
“We’re all hooked,” Andrzekewski said. He pointed to how much he personally got out of the experience. “When I go down there, the biggest recipient is me.”
Hollington agreed, noting how giving everyone is, despite all they’ve lost.
“I would find people, their whole life is being tossed out on the curb, and they’re looking at you like, ‘Can I get you something?’ ‘Can I buy you lunch if we can find a place that’s open?’” he said. “They’re very giving, and all they wanted to know was what they could do for us.”
There’s also the sense of community the volunteers build with the people they’re helping. Andrzejewski considers the people they’ve built homes for family; he refers to Maria, whose house OSC recently rebuilt, as his daughter. Bonnano said he and his wife are planning an RV trip to Florida with a side trip to visit that “family” in Louisiana.
“The hook is that five years later, you still feel a connection to the people down there,” Bonnano said.
Still to come
While that hook remains, after more than 40 missions to aid the ravaged Gulf Coast, the mission of OSC has shifted. The nonprofit launched a local counterpart, Operation Northern Comfort (ONC), three years ago to help those in need closer to home, and Andrzejewski said volunteers will likely focus their efforts there for the foreseeable future.
Among ONC’s projects is a collaboration with Tiny Homes for Good, a national organization that, according to its Facebook page, “builds and manages affordable, safe and dignified homes for individuals who have faced homelessness.” The nonprofit is looking to build four 250-square-foot homes in Syracuse at some point this year. ONC will be funding the project with proceeds from its annual Crawfish Festival, its major fundraiser.
“It takes a person who has trouble making ends meet,” Andrzejewski said. “The cost of this house is nominal. It’s very helpful. The organization provides social and job supports, as well as a sense of ownership. It beats living in a lot of the group homes and congregate places I’ve seen.”
In particular, ONC and Tiny Homes for Good will likely be helping veterans in need.
“We’ve got a consensus in ONC that vets will be a point of emphasis for us,” Andrzejewski said.
He was especially moved to help after attending a panel discussion at Clear Path for Veterans earlier this year and listening to one of the panelists speak.
“He said he had a wife and kids, and he didn’t care if he ever saw them again. He lives with them. This was his situation as a result of the war,” Andrzejewski said. “I’ve never forgotten that.”
That’s why Andrzejewski and the rest of the ONC/OSC volunteers continue to do what they do — there will always be more people who need their help. Whether it’s building a ramp for a handicapped woman in Oswego County — “A ramp can give a person freedom,” Andrzejewski said; “the ramp opens up the whole world to her” — or rebuilding the Bridgeport home of 28-year-old Timmy Dixon, who has VATER syndrome, and his mom and caregiver, Betsy, who was just diagnosed with cancer, ONC is ready and willing to provide help to anyone who needs it.
But none of it would have happened if Katrina hadn’t made landfall in New Orleans a decade ago.
“It almost sounds selfish,” Hollington said. “I’m trying to think of one of those cute little phrases about how you’re never quite sure of what path you’re supposed to follow and how life turns in ways you never expect. Most people will tell you they get more than they give. That’s certainly not the intent people have when they go down there. You give people a hand without much thought, because it seems like the right thing to do.”
To learn more or to volunteer, visit operationnc.org.
