Interesting......from The Sun Hearld photo section

[cancunkid]

This article can be found in the personal photo section at http://www.sunherald.com I just found it interesting. At that site it is accompanied by photos

katrina story/photo
my name is Carson Wynn Jr. i am employed by treasure bay casino resort as a security medical officer. on 8/28/05 i reported to work at the casino's hotel located north of hwy 90 as part of the treasure bay kamikaze crew, a team of crew members that volunteered to stay on the property to ride the storm out, when i took the first photo, and the last, of the casino property as the first serious bands of the storm were making their way onto the coast. none of the 30 plus crew members that made the decision to stay at the hotel had any idea of what was about to take place. the engineers that were there stated that the main entrance was at least 15+ feet above sea level so many of the crew members parked their personal cars under the overhang along side treasure bay vehicles. by 0830 hours on 8/29/05 the storm was really starting to get worse and that's when we noticed the water was about 50 feet away from the lobby of the hotel. some time around 0900 hours we believe a tornado may have
formed just to the east of the hotel and that it destroyed the adult book store next to our hotel and it also caused a section of the hotel over hang, which is the ball room on the second floor of the hotel, to collapse less than 20 feet from where i was standing. after narrowly escaping serious injury myself and the other Crew members sought refuge in the stair well located on the west side of the hotel as it offered the most protection because it was constructed from solid reinforced concrete. once every one was inside it seemed Katrina unleashed her full fury. the stair well began to shake and rock what seemed like several feet in all direction and we could feel objects on the out side strike the out side of the stair well and we noticed water rising from the bottom of the stair well forcing us to climb higher up. some time later the glass windows at the very top of stair well shattered and rained down the stair well causing those of us in the stair well to rush out onto the 4th
floor of the hotel how ever several people got trapped in the stair well when the stair well door slammed shut and no one was able to reopen it. about 10 minutes later those trapped in the stair well were rescued by members of the security department and the engineering crew. we then decided to stay on the 4th floor until the storm ended. later that night when the storm winds dropped we emerged to discover the devastation brought on us by Katrina. cars were piled into the lobby and the pirates den lounge on the fist floor and the new treasure bay limo, with the optional "storm" package was on the west side of the hotel more than 50 feet from where it had been parked. and we saw the damage the casino barge and the fort building had sustained and we all knew Katrina was much more than what any one could have imagined. the next day Bernie Burkeholder, president and CEO of treasure bay, who had been right beside his crew members inside the hotel managed to acquire a four wheeler ATV to
access the damages across the hwy as the engineering crew managed to get a small generator operation to restore power to the hotel operations center. executive chef miller and his staff of chefs went to work preparing the kitchen, which was dark and unventilated, to serve meals to the crew members. director of security Rajnic began to organize his security officers to protect the property and help engineering access the property for danger areas. it was amazing the way every one came together and that no one was seriously injured. we all survived
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