Volunteers in orange T-shirts running chainsaws and tarping roofs have become icons of the U.S. Disaster Relief projects of Samaritan’s Purse. Yet it took many years for this aspect of the ministry to develop. The first U.S. Disaster Relief Unit was a converted tractor-trailer that deployed for the first time in 1998 to help victims…
Louisiana Homeowner Grateful for God’s Grace
Cary Castile wasn’t expecting to be displaced for weeks when he evacuated from Louisiana to Texas ahead of Hurricane Laura in August 2020. And, when he did return to his Lake Charles home, he said the widespread devastation broke his heart. “Almost the entire city was damaged. The power lines were down. It was a…
‘God Is Looking After Me’
Some seven months ago, Samaritan’s Purse assisted homeowner Mel Williams and more than 900 other families following destruction from Hurricanes Laura and Delta. Last week, deadly flooding swept through Lake Charles and our teams deployed once again to bring relief to hurting families in Louisiana. “We’ve had a pretty rough couple of months,” Mel explained.…
Team Patriot Volunteers Help a Fellow Veteran in Louisiana
Residents of Lake Charles, Louisiana, a working-class town of nearly 78,000 people, are weather weary. They have seen their city ravaged by two hurricanes, crippled by an ice storm, and inundated by floodwaters—all within the past nine months. First, Hurricane Laura, a Category 4 storm, roared into Lake Charles in late August. It was the…
Casas y esperanzas restauradas en la ciudad Lake Charles.
When Hurricane Laura roared ashore in southern Louisiana last August, 2020 already felt like a year full of storms for Lake Charles homeowners Rufus and Shirley Goodwin. COVID-19 hit them hard in the spring and hospitalized them both. The symptoms were so severe that they feared for their lives. Then the hurricanes hit. Category 4…
Volunteer Helped Hurricane Florence Victims in Jesus’ Name
SIGN UP TO VOLUNTEER FOR OUR HURRICANE FLORENCE RESPONSE Julio Hernandez was moved with compassion when he heard about how Hurricane Florence devasted the North Carolina coast. “Your heart breaks for people, and you want to do anything you can to help and comfort them,” he said. Julio, who has served in the Army for…
Equipping Farmers on Dominica Long After Hurricane Maria
“After Hurricane Maria, we had no hope,” Norla said. “We were really hurting. We had nothing to plant and nothing to eat.” Norla serves as the village council secretary of Vieille Case, Dominica, by day and farms in the evenings. Many farmers in Dominica will tell you similar stories. After Hurricane Maria destroyed the agricultural…
Edward Graham alentó a los sobrevivientes de Acapulco
Edward Graham, Samaritan’s Purse COO, visited Acapulco, Mexico, on Nov. 16 to encourage storm survivors and view some of the relief work our organization has provided in response to Hurricane Otis’ surprise strike on the popular tourist city in late October. “Hurricane Otis came through here and destroyed massive amounts of the city,” Graham said.…
Hurricane Harvey Victim Happy to Be Home Again
Ever since Hurricane Harvey flooded Rodney Turner’s Houston home with a foot-and-a-half of rainwater almost a year ago, he’s been sleeping on his parents’ living room couch. A coat hook on the back of a door served as his closet. All of his furniture was ruined by the flooding, and flooring and drywall throughout the…