NATIONAL PARK SERVICE

MORNING REPORT

BLACKBERRY EDITION

Thursday, September 29, 2005

INCIDENTS

Yosemite NP

Funeral Arrangements for Special Agent Dan Madrid

Funeral arrangements have been announced for Special Agent Dan Madrid.

Visitation will be from 2 p.m. to 6 p.m. on Sunday, October 2nd, at the Kutis Funeral Home on 2906 Gravois Road, St. Louis, Missouri 63118 (314-772-3000).

The funeral will be at 10 a.m. on Monday, October 3rd, at the Basilica of Saint Louis the King (the Old Cathedral on the Gateway Arch grounds), 209 Walnut Street, St. Louis, Missouri 63102 (314-231-3250).

Following the service, there will be a procession from Old Cathedral to Saints Peter and Paul Cemetery on 7030 Gravois Road in St. Louis.

The NPS uniform of the day is winter dress. The dress service jacket or blouse is preferred. For the funeral service at the Old Cathedral, all uniformed NPS personnel, with or without marked vehicles, must arrive no later than 9 a.m. Lodging information for NPS employees will follow.

As noted previously, flags at all parks nationwide, except for those within the National Mall and Memorial Parks in downtown Washington, are to be lowered to half staff through the date of interment, now determined as Monday, October 3rd. Flags are to be returned to full staff on Tuesday, October 4th. Employees are authorized to wear mourning bands on their badges or other suitable mourning devices if in civilian clothes through Monday. [Frank Mares, Public Information Officer]

Gulf Coast Areas

Update on Recovery from Hurricane Rita

Big Thicket NP

The Central IMT (Eddie Lopez, IC) is charged with assisting the parks and employees affected by Hurricane Rita, primarily Big Thicket NP, and with supporting communities around the park.

Thanks to two large electric generators, the main visitor center at Big Thicket National

Preserve now has power. Park employees, families, and emergency workers can now enjoy air conditioning and a warm shower - things they have not had since the hurricane hit last Friday. Telephone lines are also up and working, making communicating with the public and the Central IMT a lot easier. More large generators are expected to arrive soon and mail could be delivered to residents in the Village Mills area as early as tomorrow.

Two dedicated members of the Big Thicket Association have also returned to the park.

Maxine Johnston, who has been in Big Thicket since 1964, and Ann Roberts were escorted by a park ranger today to Maxine's house. The ranger helped to clear trees that were restricting access and transported two cases of water and a generator to the home.

Team members and park staff went to Beaumont today to take a hard look at the condition of the park headquarters building. This assessment had been delayed until now so that emergency workers could focus first on the needs of the park employees, families, and local residents.

This was the second full day that the members of the Alabama Coushatta Tribal Community received three hot meals. Plans are in the works to begin hot food delivery to people in the Village Mills area of the park.

The team set up its new ICP in Huntsville on Tuesday. This put the team significantly closer to the disaster area and allows members of the team to commute to the preserve on a daily basis.

[Al Nash, IO, Central IMT]

Gulf Coast Areas

Update on Recovery from Hurricane Katrina

Jean Lafitte NHP&P/New Orleans Jazz NHP

The National IMT (JD Swed, IC) is charged with both assisting the employees of the two parks and with overseeing the overall NPS response to the hurricane.

Report pending.

Gulf Islands NS

The Pacific West IMT (Denny Ziemann, IC) is charged with assisting employees and helping with the rehabilitation of the Mississippi District.

Island operations continue yesterday. Debris piles were redistributed and some of the debris from Hurricane Katrina disappeared with Hurricane Rita. Most of the rotting chickens are now gone from West Ship Island. Although Rita removed some debris from the island, some was re-distributed and new debris appeared. Two crews were assigned today to assist FEMA in moving it's camp from Gautier to Vancleave. Debris removal continues in the Davis Bayou area with concentration on roadside debris and piles of wood from the tree cutting near the VC.

The SET team continues to provide law enforcement and EMS services to the park and incident staff. The team assisted with traffic control due to a dump truck that rolled over near the park boundary yesterday. The truck was not an NPS vehicle.

The Employee Assistance Branch continues to help park employees. Information and assistance packets have been distributed to Davis Bayou employees. Uniforms have been received from the cache at Bandelier National Park and an emergency uniform replacement request has been faxed to Uniform Solutions for processing.

There are 231 people working on this incident, including 11 park staff.

Information Directory

A web site has been established as a repository for official documents related to hurricane recovery operations: HYPERLINK "http://inside.nps.gov/waso/waso.cfm?prg=15&lv=1" http://inside.nps.gov/waso/waso.cfm?prg=15&lv=1.

[Kris Fister, IO, IMT, JELA/JAZZ; Shauna Dyas, IO, IMT, GUIS]

Olympic NP

Structural Fire at Lake Crescent Lodge

The roof on the Lake Crescent Lodge caught fire around 9 p.m. on Saturday, September 24th. The local fire department was dispatched, but the fire had been extinguished by concession employees using hose lines by the time they arrived. The damage was limited to a four foot by four foot section of roof, plus some water damage. All indications are that the roof caught fire due to sparks from the chimney. There were about 60 people dining at the lodge at the time of the fire. The building was evacuated; there were no injuries. [Mike Warren, NPS Fire and Aviation Management]

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Prepared by Visitor and Resource Protection, WASO, with the cooperation and support of Delaware Water Gap NRA.

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