Donations heading to North Carolina relief efforts today

Two truckloads of supplies will arrive in North Carolina tomorrow to help those impacted by Hurricane Helene’s devastation. Another trailer and likely some extra loads will follow soon afterward.

Organizers of the collection are overwhelmed at the generosity of local residents and businesses that stepped forward to help.

“This is tremendous,” said Robert Bayer, OFS National Warehouse Operations Manager. “We didn’t expect this big of a turnout.”

Businesses, churches and individuals have been showing up with pallets and truckloads of supplies at the collection points in Huntingburg and Dale at Spencer Industries. The Dale Company coordinated its collection efforts with OFS. Steinkamp Home Center also stepped up to donate half a truckload of shingles to be used in the eventual rebuilding efforts.

“It seems like everytime we were down there (the collection point) there were three, four trucks back to back to back,” said Chelsea Bland, OFS Recruiting Marketing and Retention.

Bayer will head down with the group this afternoon with equipment to offload the supplies being palleted at Styline Logistics in Huntingburg. Initially, the supplies were going to be delivered to the fire department in Conover, North Carolina, but organizers learned the relief efforts there don’t have room for more supplies at this time. OFS is now coordinating with Missionary Wesleyan Church in Forest City.

The pallets of water, diapers, formula, and more will be offloaded to the church’s gymnasium to be prepared for distribution to the areas most severely impacted by Helene.

The efforts to help those hit by the flooding and destruction of Helene have been hampered by the devastation of infrastructure, including the roads in some of these areas.

“People are coming in on ATVs to pick up and take it up into the mountains for people,” Bayer said, adding that the church they are working with has confirmed a lot of supplies are being delivered this way.

Sometimes, ATVs can’t get to people.

“There are places where they’re taking pack mules in because they physically cannot get any further even with ATVs,” Bland added.

OFS has held collections for relief efforts for previous disasters. “This is by far the best turnout we have had for this type of effort,” Bland said. “We have employees that have families that were affected. We know people in the area.”

Bayer added that in one case, an employee’s 90-year-old mother had to be airlifted out of the impacted areas. Pointing to what the company is doing with the help of all the donors in the area, he explained these efforts are near and dear to that employee’s heart.

Wednesday morning, company volunteers and students from Southridge High School began offloading the supplies from the trailers and sorting them to be ready for shipping. Along with the donations, OFS drivers and employees have volunteered to take the materials down.

OFS extended a thank you to all who helped in the relief efforts, and Bayer added that he wanted to thank the Menke family for supporting the collection and transportation of the materials.

Coordinators were unsure whether they would organize a second round of relief efforts for North Carolina due to the unknowns involved with Hurricane Milton.