Bahamas Relief Flight and Wide Spread Distruction

I am sorry to report that the out island of the Bahamas to include San Salvador, Crooked, Rum Cay, Long Cay and the Acklins are in very bad condition. I was part of a 2 ship flight out of Palm Beach Sunday bound for Crooked Island with 2,000 lbs of Food, Water and First Aid. I loaded up 3 cases of MRE's and First Aid into the RV6 and headed to South FL to join my great friends that fly an Airvan and Aztec.
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Our first stop to drop supplies was at Pittstown and I hardly recognized the place as complete destruction of the lodge.
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Colonel Hill Airport was partly flooded on Saturday, but we were able to get in on Sunday afternoon and drop additional supplies as did several other private pilots that donated their aircraft, fuel, time and many purchased food and water with money from their pockets.
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The good news about Crooked Island is that all residents have been accounted for and from what we understand no fatalities as a result of the hurricane. It will take them a couple of years to rebuild and ongoing support will be needed.

A command post has been setup by Pathfinder at Georgetown (Exuma) that is coordinating relief efforts. Exuma is 100 miles North East of Crooked and although they had high winds they escaped any serious damage.
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Stella Maris was pumping fuel yesterday and the runway was in good shape. Cat Island had heavy wind, but just some shingles blown off so they are OK.

We heard that Rum Cay, San Salvador, Long Cay and the Acklins took the brunt and like Crooked have wide spread destruction.

We met the Coast Guard crew that picked up the life ring from the El Faro on Saturday. They are also operating out of Georgetown but based in Clearwater FL.
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Our 2nd plane (Aztec) flew North and East of Crooked yesterday and found a portion of the debris field to include floating containers and an oil slick believed to be from the El Faro. We relayed lat/Lon via the Guard Channel back to Exuma and the Coast Guard launched to investigate. Sadly it doesn't look good for the crew of 30.

I am humbled and and at the same time amazed at the generosity of our private pilot community that are coming together to help out friends, and in many cases complete strangers. The first responders have not been government officials, but private pilots that want to assist and are making a difference.

Thanks for the report and "Good on Ya" for doing some good for your fellow man. I was wondering how bad the Bahamas were hit.

Fly 4 Life...

X21RV6A said:

I am humbled and and at the same time amazed at the generosity of our private pilot community that are coming together to help out friends, and in many cases complete strangers. The first responders have not been government officials, but private pilots that want to assist and are making a difference.

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Brian,
I say the same thing about missionary aviators...
I've been a regular at Crooked Island for 15 years and have some good friends (retired USCG) who own a beach house there. They emailed me photos of their place and reiterated the blessing that no lives were lost on C.I., just lots of damage.
I've cleaned up after many "canes" growing up in FL, but you never get used to seeing the destruction.

Thanks for what you and your friends are doing
V/R
Smokey

X21RV6A said:

The first responders have not been government officials, but private pilots that want to assist and are making a difference.

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And this shouldn't surprise anyone. Thanks General Aviation community for all you've done/doing. Folks need help NOW and can't wait for some government committee to set up a task force to study the problems then debate options while worrying about who gets credit/political traction out of it in the next election cycle.

this is the type of thing I'd like to be doing with my RV. Good on you, sir.

Way to go

Way to go Brian. The best experiences of my life were mission trips I made. Hope your experience was great and I know those meals and supplies were a great help to someone. John

Sad

Pittstown/Crooked island was where our Canadian invasion team spent several nights in may. Cynthia and Berkely were awesome. To see our rooms smashed, office and restaurant smashed and the beachside grill destroyed like that is so sad. The brand new hangar was free to use too and now is completely stripped of all walls door and roof. Unbelievable how bad it looks now.

Owner of resort apparently owns bojangles chicken in US (sp?) They are wonderful people on that island with a great little resort. Hope they can rebuild and great to hear no lives lost.

For those that help...good for you. THANKS.

Arrival Process

Do you guys have to clear customs there before you drop off the relief items?
cj

Clearing Customs

We had to clear customs at MYEH North Eleuthera inbound and at MYLS Stella Maris outbound. The Bahamian officials just suspended the landing and departure fees for all aircraft participating in the relief effort. This was not the case for us on Sunday/Monday. We did hear that Nassau was offering fuel at no charge for those private aircraft that were assisting, but we didn't have a chance to take them up on the offer.

Can you fill me in on how I can help?
I wouldn't mind doing a mission.
Send me a PM.

Contact in the Bahamas for Relief Effort

Paul Aranha is in Nassau at Odyssey FBO and is coordinating the effort. He can also be found on FaceBook and has additional information there.

They need help and will be happy to hear from anyone willing to assist.

I own a house about less than a mile east of Pittstown. Went down last Monday and returned on Friday. Unbelievable destruction as everyone knows by now. My house did OK, lost a lot of shingles and one window was blown out. Others did not fare so well and many of our friends and neighbors lost everything. Landrail Point suffered the most with water rising to the ceilings in many homes.

There are a couple of GoFundMe sites set up for those that wish to contribute money to help bring in supplies. One, in particular, has DC3s bringing in supplies to the Colonel Hill airport on Crooked. These funds go to help the Bahamian citizens and residents only, not owners, like myself, that have vacation homes.

https://www.gofundme.com/ck5m9t4g

Here is a link to some pics I took of some homes around me. Due to the poor condition (or non existence) of the road, I wasn't able to get to some of the more severely damaged homes.

Link to pics

Here is a video of Pittstown Point I received. VIDEO