Teachers Home Safe

By Ashleigh McCune
The Big Easy turned out to be not so easy for five Parkersburg High School teachers. Dan Daniel, Jim Dennis, David and Theresa Marlow and Sue Steinbeck traveled to New Orleans for an Advanced Placement conference. They stayed at the Sheraton Hotel on downtown Canal Street.

On Friday there was no indication of Hurricane Katrina coming close to New Orleans. Saturday morning however these teachers awoke to a whole new reality. The hurricane had taken an unexpected turn and was heading right in New Orleans’ direction. The storm was now a category five.

The conference that was supposed to last Saturday and Sunday only lasted for half of Saturday. The teachers were originally supposed to leave Monday morning. Saturday and Sunday were spent sightseeing and taking snapshots, like any tourists would do. Many teachers at the conference were flown out in time, but these five PHS teachers got the unfortunate news that they were going to have to ride out the storm.

All the guests of the Sheraton Hotel had to stay in the fifth-floor ballroom because it had no windows and was built to sustain winds of 200 miles per hour. The hotel was prepared for the hurricane; they provided food and water for guests and set up four phones and computers so guests could contact their loved ones. The waiting time to use these phones and computers was two to three hours. Many other hotels in the area, including the one across the street from the Sheraton, made their guests leave because they were not prepared and could not care for them.

“The hurricane wasn’t the most dangerous part, it was what happened afterwards that was the most dangerous,” said Dan Daniel. These dangerous things were looting and the law enforcement becoming almost powerless. “Overnight it became a third-world country. Food, water, electricity, medical facilities and an organized police force is what separated our country from the others and the next day we saw society collapse, chaos happened overnight,” said Daniel.

Finally on Wednesday night the teachers got the good news that they were going to get to leave by bus, taking a 13- hour ride to Dallas, Texas to the airport. There was only one accessible road out of New Orleans and on the way out the bus was in complete silence because the people knew that hijacking and other dangers were a real possibility. “People were pounding on our bus and making threatening gestures to us,” said Daniel.

Once the teachers reached Dallas on Thursday morning, they stayed in the Westin Hotel, a branch of the Sheraton. They flew to Pittsburgh that morning and were supposed to fly from there to the Wood County Regional Airport but ironically the flight was cancelled. The group of teachers finally arrived home safely on Friday morning.

“I have learned to appreciate what I have and be more patient with the small things that bother me. The organized society that we have enjoyed for centuries is fragile and can disappear overnight. I also have learned not to go to New Orleans during hurricane season,” commented Daniel, an instructor at West Virginia University at Parkersburg who missed two classes of teaching his Educational Technology class.

As Daniel finishes his amazing story he shows me four items that really helped get him through the storm: wet wipes since there was no way to bathe, a flashlight, a Sheraton Hotel key since he was lucky enough to be in a hotel that cared for their guests and a small cup used to drink water that has the saying printed on it “Life is short. Live like you mean it.” A saying we should live by after this devastating event.