Hurricane Ivan
After spending considerable time and resources on pre-production, we officially kicked off primary production activities in mid September 2004 after Hurricane Ivan made landfall.
The 2004 hurricane season had been particularly active and had been brutalizing the residents of Florida. After contacting the United States Forest Service in Washington DC, we were invited to follow the efforts of the Pacific North West National Incident Management Team 3 (PNW 3).
At the request of FEMA, PNW 3 had been activated to provide support for over 100 National Guard Reservists who were being deployed to Milton Florida to aid in recovery efforts. Our team of two, myself and a cameraman, quickly arranged airfare, ground transportation and lodging in order to get us into the area and support our needs. Having lived in South Florida as a boy, and after seeing the devastation of Hurricane Andrew in 1992, I rechecked with the travel agent to ensure our hotel actually existed. Note to self: Never trust your travel agent if they haven’t lived through a hurricane. As luck would have it, just before our departure, we learned that our hotel had been relocated…scattered actually, so we were forced to stage over 2 hours away in Tallahassee.
Driving past check points with a two man camera crew in a rental car, does not inspire confidence with local law enforcement, however as I had caught a red eye just after coming off duty, I looked like I was supposed to be there, and in fact we did have authorization. This fact was also especially comforting to a local motorist who accidentally started a fire in the center median of the interstate. Note to self: Camera equipment is of little use for fire suppression.
To be continued…