By Paul Gingras

Dave Kasper (left) and Brian Kasper pose in front of their private helicopter after returning from helping survivors of Hurricane Katrina.

"We were still over a hundred miles away and we could already see the devastation," said Dave Kasper of St. Ignace, who flew in a private helicopter with his father, Brian, Wednesday, August 31, to help with relief efforts following Hurricane Katrina.

"Houses were destroyed even at that distance," Mr. Kasper said. "Roofs were torn off, and trailers were flattened to the ground. It looked like a series of tornadoes hit the area. People were cutting up fallen trees, caring for their roads, and for each other."

Devastated areas of New Orleans as seen from the Kaspers' helicopter. They landed at St. John's airport, 10 miles outside New Orleans. Near Lake Pontchartrain they found downed fences and water damage nearly everywhere they looked.

The Kaspers' came on their own initiative, not as members of an established organization. Using the experience and equipment they'd brought with them, the Kaspers got to work almost immediately. David, 33, is a volunteer firefighter trained in search and rescue. Brian, 57, has been a pilot for almost 40 years.

After failing to coordinate a mission with the Red Cross and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), they teamed with the Emergency Operations Command Center in Louisiana, and, using their helicopter's 900 pounds of storage capacity, they spent the next three days flying medical supplies from a warehouse in Baton Rouge to a hospital in Franklinton, Louisiana.

"The hospital had no power," Brian Kasper said. "Homeland Security had left a huge generator there, but it wasn't hooked up. Even so, hospital personnel had their heads together."

The Kaspers also flew a doctor to a hospital in Mississippi, where he planned to volunteer. There, the three men saw a small tent-city set up outside.

Each day, they took off from St. John's Reserve National Airport 10 miles outside of New Orleans, and as the week progressed, air traffic increased.

"By Friday it looked like fireflies in the air," Dave Kasper said.

The military had arrived in force; dozens of helicopters flew only 20 to 30 feet away from each other.

"You could look over and practically read the lips of the pilot next to you, Mr. Kasper continued. "The military is trained to fly like that. For us, it was way too close."

A massive AWAX airplane circled above the weather-torn region, providing air traffic control from the sky, since ground facilities were useless without power.

"Those guys did an exceptional job dealing with all that," Mr. Kasper said. "They didn't land the whole time. They refueled in the air and set up a Temporary Restricted Flight Area, which allowed only those directly involved in the relief effort to fly in the area.

At one point, the AWAX reported that shooting had broken out near a hospital in New Orleans. Everyone was ordered to leave the area.

On Saturday, the Kaspers found themselves near downtown New Orleans, a scene of near chaos where people scrambled to board buses.

"If you tried to land a helicopter in many areas, it would get mobbed," Mr. Kasper said. "People wanted out of there. But with our 900 pounds of useful capacity, it made more sense to fly supplies in to help keep people alive than to fly people out of there."

Looking back on last week, Dave Kasper has mixed feelings about relief efforts.

"The military was slow," he said. "But you've got to understand that materials are spread out all over the country. There's a way to do it right. When the Army got there, though, things happened really fast."

On the other hand, Mr. Kasper also related a series of incidents which he said revealed questionable priorities.

"There was an area of stilt houses in Lake Pontchartrain where kids were stranded," he said. "A helicopter with reporters on it came in, got their story, and then just left them there."

The journalists' pilot notified the Kaspers, and Brian Kasper delivered supplies to them. According to Mr. Kasper, the youths had suffered lacerations.

Commenting on relief organizations in general, Dave Kasper described efforts as "minimal at best."

"If it wasn't for the military throwing supplies down to the ground," he said, "I don't know what would have happened."

Dave and Brian Kasper were not the only area residents to aid in relief efforts or to express mixed feelings concerning the effectiveness of relief organizations.

"I didn't see anyone from FEMA down there," said Tim Nelson, a fireman and first responder with the Hendricks Township Fire Department, and a member of North Tree Fire International, a California based fire department composed of specialists from all over the United States.

"On the third or fourth day, we entered a NASA base," he said. "They had 100 semis loaded with food and supplies. People there asked us, 'Are you from FEMA?' and told us they wouldn't do anything with their supplies until they had FEMA's permission. It was time for action," he said, "not the time to wait for pencil pushers or to have a meeting.

"I have a feeling some people may get fired over this," he added, "but I'm confident the president will get to the bottom of it and coordinate things very soon."

For six days, Mr. Nelson worked in the affected area, setting up staging areas to place generators for use by fire departments, police departments, retirement homes, and hospitals.

Unlike the Kaspers, Mr. Nelson worked on the ground and saw a different side of the aftermath.

"The only out-of-town relief workers I saw were from the Red Cross," he said. "Most of the help for victims came from residents helping each other. Local fire and police were so tapped out. They worked 24 hours a day and slept where they worked. They were overwhelmed, but they were doing the job."

Not only was the toll on human beings difficult to witness, but Mr. Nelson was struck by the pets lost or abandoned in the aftermath of the hurricane.

"A lot of them had leashes or chains around their necks," he said. "You could tell they belonged to someone."

Mr. Nelson worked near Biloxi, Mississippi, an area that endured the worst of the tidal surge, where he saw debris such as clothes and mattresses 15 feet up in the trees.

"There were houses blown over," he said. "In some areas where houses had been, there was nothing left.

"Imagine half the trees from Escanaba to St. Ignace blown down. It was something like that, as if there were nothing left south of Moran to the lake."

Mr. Nelson did not witness malicious looting. What he did see were desperate people gathering needed supplies. According to him, things got worse as days went on.

Eventually, Mr. Nelson and his crew made their way to New Orleans. There, they were instructed not to enter the city. He used a cellular telephone to call Dave Kasper, his colleague on the Hendricks Township Fire Department. To his amazement, Mr. Kasper was nearby. After days of turmoil, Tim Nelson, Dave Kasper, and Brian Kasper made their way back to Michigan.

"I couldn't believe the U.S. could do so well at helping people all over the world," Mr. Nelson said, "but we were disorganized at helping our own."

According to Dave Kasper, the most tragic aspect of the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina were the senseless actions of some of the people.

"Shooting at rescue operations was the most ignorant thing I've ever seen," he said. "It was also frustrating to see the media scare the rest of the U.S. by showing only the negative, not the positive things going on."

"On my way home," said Mr. Nelson, "I wrote the bad things and the good things down in my journal. It was incredible to see how one woman down there took care of umpteen number of people. There were a lot of people like that."

Mr. Kasper agreed.

"The best thing out of all of this was seeing people willing to help each other, people they didn't even know."

After experiencing the devastation to the south, Mr. Kasper thinks the best thing Michigan people can do to help is to take up donations for victims. He insists, however, that those who do so find reputable organizations for the delivery of funds. Mr. Nelson suggests going through the Red Cross.

Today, the Kasper helicopter sits back on its landing pad in Gaylord. Dave Kasper says it's a relief to be home where everyone knows their neighbors.

"This event makes me think of the potential disasters we could have here," he said. "We need to use our minds. There are inexpensive ways we could prepare for our own worst case scenario."