Published: September 05, 2008 09:40 am         

Gov says Miss. helped by ‘grace of God’ in Gustav

GULFPORT, Miss. — High school players are practicing for Friday night football, restaurants are serving shrimp po’ boys and casinos are filled with flashing lights and the relentless ding-ding-ding of slot machines.

The Mississippi Gulf Coast is easing back into business after being shaken, but not badly stirred, by Hurricane Gustav.

“We were just blessed by the grace of God,” Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour said Wednesday after taking a nearly two-hour helicopter tour of the coast.

South Mississippi is still recovering from losing thousands of homes and businesses in Hurricane Katrina three years ago. Completing an aerial tour the day after Katrina, a visibly shaken Barbour declared: “It looks like Hiroshima.”

This time, the scene is considerably less dramatic.

An Associated Press reporter and photographer accompanied Barbour and other officials Wednesday as three helicopters flew over two of the three coastal counties — Hancock County, which borders Louisiana, and Harrison County, which is in the center of Mississippi’s 70-mile coastline.

Gustav blew ashore Monday in Louisiana, about 70 miles west of New Orleans. Barbour estimated the storm flooded about 300 homes in Mississippi.

Mississippi Power Co., which serves much of the coast, said it restored electricity to all its customers by Tuesday. Other utility companies said about 35,000 inland homes and businesses remained without power Wednesday, some as far away as Natchez.

Most school districts have reopened. Amite, Franklin and Wilkinson counties and Natchez Adams will remain closed on Thursday. But only Amite County will be closed on Friday, according to the Mississippi Department of Education.

During the helicopter tour, water could be seen standing around only a few houses in Pearlington, near the Louisiana border. Heavy equipment cleaned debris from roads. A tractor cleared a railroad track in Hancock County.

The white-sand beach along U.S. 90 was strewn for miles with lumber, trash and brown grass. A few sailboats and fishing boats had been tossed ashore.

Unlike the day after Katrina, when an AP reporter also flew with the governor’s contingent, there were no upside-down vehicles visible in the shallow waters near the shore Wednesday and there were no massive casino barges or shipping containers tossed on top of homes.

Traffic was brisk Wednesday as thousands of evacuees returned home.

Barbour said Mississippi officials are watching Tropical Storm Ike, which could arrive in the Bahamas on Sunday as a hurricane.

“Hurricane fatigue is a real issue,” the governor said. “We have to be vigilant next week.”

During a news conference at the Air National Guard center in Gulfport, Maj. Gen. Bill Freeman, Mississippi’s adjutant general, said 400 National Guard members were sent home from the coast Wednesday, another 400 will leave Thursday and the final 100 will leave Friday. The guard deployed 2,700 to the coast for Gustav.

Barbour said he hopes the federal government will reimburse some of the state’s Gustav preparation expenses.