Just one story from today in 2005.

BILOXI, Miss. (WLOX) - As Hurricane Katrina approached the Mississippi Coast on this day 14 years ago, Biloxi firefighters were warned that they would see things they had never seen before.

Memories of the storm's devastation will live forever in the minds of Coast residents, possibly more so for first responders.

“I remember clear as a bell, coming out on Howard Avenue, thinking ‘Dear God, this is unbelievable,’” said Tim Groue who had only been with the department for six months.

Andy Mason was the chief at Station One. They had made a daunting drive to get a man to the hospital and the return trip was memorable.

“I can remember roofs flying overhead, whole roofs flying over the pumper, and stuff, you know debris, shingles, tin, everything, stop signs going left and right," he said.

After the storm, they were lost in their own city.

“I can remember me coming to Kuhn Street and literally - I grew up on Oak Street right here - and, um, I didn’t know where Kuhn Street was,” Grue said. “I knew where it was, but I had no landmarks to go by. It was like feeling around in the dark.”

"It was nothing but trees," said firefighter Sammy Jenner. "Trees, trees, trees then all of a sudden you get to a line of houses in a pile. Just chopped up, piled up houses, wires...," his voice trailed off as he paused.

There were many rescues, including to save their own men. Two Biloxi stations were taking on water; one was the Back Bay Station.

“On our way to Back Bay, we cut up Reynoir Street,” Mason described. “And, you know, I’ve never been in the military, never been in a war zone, but I imagine that is what it was like to be in a war zone because everybody that was walking up saying ‘Hey we need help’ had this weird, spaced-out look like they had been through hell.”

Along the way, they had picked up 19 of these dazed residents and piled them onto their engine to take them to safety. Six crew members did what they could to keep them safe.

“We were riding on the side of it, holding onto handles to keep people who were across our pump panel standing and just trying to keep them safe on the inside,” said Nick Geiser.

What used to be a simple trip across town was a nightmare.

“You could see dead bodies on the way to cut our people out,” Mason said. "All you could do is check a pulse and move on because it was important to get to our guys that were at Back Bay at the time.

“And you could only make 100 yards, maybe 200 yards at a time because you would have to cut trees, power lines, cable lines, everything that was across the road. We just made it so it was eight foot wide or so so we could get our apparatus through.”

Meanwhile, about 20 civilians had made their way to the Back Bay Station, which was under five feet of water. Firefighters there piled the civilians on top of their engine and waited for help.

Then-firefighter Joe Bates described the wait.

“Us sitting at Back Bay, we didn’t realize what was taking so long for them to get to us. We could see the little bit of destruction that was there on Back Bay and we knew the water that had come up on us, but we still at that point didn’t know the extent of the debris field out on the streets," he said.

“I can remember picking so many people up and transporting them to the hospital over and over and over again,” Grue said. "And I could hear them on the radio about how much trouble they were having just getting to Station 3 to try to get those guys. It was overwhelming; it really was overwhelming.

“We were doing everything we possibly could to the extent that our chiefs would allow us in a safe manner,” Grue said. “I can remember that clear as a bell. It was an unbelievable experience that I don’t ever want to go through again.”

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LINK: https://www.wlox.com/2019/08/2...biloxi-firefighters/