By By MARCIA STEFFENS / Dowagiac Daily News
NILES - "Just imagine what you see on TV magnified," Reggie Mesko, who returned Sept. 21 from Gulfport, Miss., told listeners at the China Chef in Niles, where he was eating quite a different lunch than the Meals Ready to Eat (MRE) he lived on for the previous two weeks.
Mesko, a native of Cassopolis and now of Eau Claire, is the sole federal employee of the Niles Agricultural inspection building (USDA APHIS PPQ) which has been closed about a year, after being in Niles for nearly 25 years.
He was sent to Gulfport to help clean up the government's facility there and get it back online.
Even steel poles were pulled up with cement, he added. "Pieces were everywhere. Wooden buildings were flattened."
The facility where he was working was surrounded by a chain link fence. "Inside pieces had blown in and stuff was scattered. Government cars had their windows blown out."
During the two weeks he was there, arriving a few days after Hurricane Katrina, patrols searched for bodies.
Signs were posted stating a curfew, saying looters would be shot. When he first arrived at the beginning of his two weeks, it was set at 6 a.m. to 8 p.m., eventually dropping to 11 p.m.
He never saw any looting, but in fact, stores which had merchandise and buildings destroyed, put clothing and stock out in the parking lot and gave it away.
He mentioned the heat. "It was 95 degrees by 9 a.m. in the morning," Mesko said. "We would work 45 minutes, drink water, work some more. I must have drunk five cases of water."
Other workers came there from Texas, bringing tools, generators, food and water. Basically, though, they ate MREs, one meal day at the courthouse where workers were served, and at one burger place, where there was a line a quarter mile long.
He said those who stayed took a chance with their lives. He expects Hurricane Rita to cause same as what he saw in Gulfport this weekend. He correctly predicted that the sea walls wouldn't hold.
He was near where a casino was picked up by the storm and moved several hundred feet. "The walls were cockeyed, but stayed together. traffic lights were on the road.
Brought up with the rising waters, the boats remained in the branches after the waters receded.
While he was there, the electric and water came back up, but the city water was still undrinkable. Maybe even more importantly, the sewer system was needed. "You wouldn't believe the smell," he said.
When the mold grows, that smell will also be terrible. "You don't want to get sick," he added. He had to receive penicillin and hepatitis shots before he left. They slept in FEMA trailers.
There is nowhere to get money - no ATMs or banks. "I saw one bank," he said, "you couldn't get near it."
Most stores are gone, but eventually the Super Wal-Mart opened and a Home Deport, both with limited goods.
But, he added, "What good is sewer and electric if they don't have a house to go back to?"