Christian relief groups braced for Ike

|PIC1|Christian relief groups fresh from a series of hurricanes in the past two weeks are bracing themselves for Hurricane Ike - a giant storm that fills most of the Gulf of Mexico.

Disaster relief teams working nearly non-stop in Louisiana in the wake of Hurricane Gustav are now shifting their attention to Texas where warning signs of fast-approaching Ike have already appeared.

As high waves crash against seawalls in Galveston and forecasters warn of "certain death" to anyone remaining in the coastal city, the Southern Baptist Convention's disaster relief arm is already feeding people at evacuation sites in San Antonio, Laredo, and the Bryan/College Station areas in Texas.

Since Hurricane Gustav's landfall in Louisiana on Labor Day, Southern Baptist volunteers have prepared almost 770,000 meals; provided 7,903 showers and 1,138 loads of laundry; made 9,122 ministry contacts; and recorded 72 Gospel presentations and 75 professions of faith, according to statistics kept by the North American Mission Board's disaster operations centre.

Meanwhile, Operation Blessing International has been working closely with partners in the Christian Relief Cooperative including The Salvation Army, Samaritan's Purse, Billy Graham Rapid Response and Convoy of Hope.

A Billy Graham Rapid Response Team will leave BGEA headquarters on Saturday with a caravan from Samaritan's Purse, it announced Thursday. The two Christian ministries, which share Franklin Graham as their CEO, plan to have Samaritan's Purse meet the physical needs of victims while the Billy Graham Rapid Response Team cares for people's spiritual and emotional needs.

In the Caribbean, Lutheran World Relief is responding to the need in Haiti, which was hit by four tropical storms and hurricanes during this hurricane season - Fay, Gustav, Hanna, and Ike. All 10 of the country's regions have been severely affected, resulting in thousands of already struggling residents without homes, food, or a way to make income, the group reported.

"Haiti is the poorest place in the Western Hemisphere," said Jean Waagbo, LWR's deputy regional director for Latin America. "With the damage done to crops and the loss of livestock, food supply will be a huge concern in the coming months. People will need a way to be able to support themselves as the country recovers."

LWR has pledged an initial $25,000 to its global aid alliance partner Action by Churches Together (ACT) International, which is working through partner Lutheran World Federation to deliver food, hygiene items and agricultural kits.

The church-based relief group is also supporting cash-for-work programmes to help farmers whose crops have been destroyed by the storms.

World Vision has begun providing local church and community partners in Texas with emergency supplies. The Christian aid organization delivered two pallets of Hasbro toys and games to the Dallas Convention Center earlier in the week to help children and families occupy their time while in the shelter, and is calling for volunteers in Dallas to help assemble hygiene kits which staff plan to ship over the weekend to partners farther south.

"We hope to get as close to Houston as possible, since that's where we anticipate the greatest need will be," said Phyllis Freeman, World Vision's director of disaster field operations. "Highway access to the most affected coastal communities will be a challenge, so we plan to bring in supplies from Dallas, to the north, as well as from our Storehouse in Mississippi, to the east."

While most aid groups focus on care for civilians, The Salvation Army provides more than 1,200 meals per day to bus drivers, emergency responders as well as storm evacuees. The Christian ministry has a large mobile kitchen and two mobile canteen units on-site in San Antonio, Texas.

Hurricane Ike is currently a Category 2 storm and has already buffeted Texas and Louisiana, earlier than forecasts predicted. The unusually large storm could become a Category 3 storm with winds of at least 111 mph before the eye strikes land, according to weather forecasts.

A little more than half of Galveston's 58,000 people have been evacuated, the city's spokeswoman Mary Jo Naschke estimated Friday morning, according to CNN. But the other half are choosing to ride out the storm.

About 3.5 million people live in the storm's impact zone, according to federal estimates.