West Sunbury American Legion sends supplies to hurricane-stricken areas
WEST SUNBURY — A month and a half after Hurricane Helene laid waste to parts of the Deep South, some residents of Butler County still are rendering assistance to the stricken area in any way they can. This includes the American Legion Post 243 in West Sunbury, which sent a cache of supplies to Tennessee by hauler Monday, Nov. 11.
Volunteering to both supply and drive the hauler for the effort was Ryan Mong of Night Train Trucking, based in Harrisville.
“We just put it all together and went through the Legion and got donations,” Mong said. “The community and the Legion together made it happen.”
In addition to owning a trucking company, Mong is a member of the Sons of the American Legion, as well as an American Legion Rider.
“Basically, I was on vacation with a group of friends, and we just started discussing that maybe we should do something to help down there,” Mong said. “And I have the trucking company and the means to do it. It’s been about a month now that we’ve been taking donations and getting everything started.”
Mong took off from the American Legion lodge on West Sunbury Road around 1 p.m. Monday, bound for Bristol Motor Speedway in Bristol, Tenn., a NASCAR venue serving as the disaster relief hub for the northeast Tennessee region.
“They have a big staging area for where they’re going to distribute the stuff,” Mong said. “It’s about eight hours to drive down there.”
The American Legion held a donation drive throughout October, asking the public to drop off emergency supplies at the lodge.
“We gathered clothes, building materials for roofs, generators, heaters, food, baby supplies, kid clothes,” said volunteer Taylor Greenawalt. “Pretty much anything that you would need to live.”
Hurricane Helene struck the southeast United States with tremendous fury in late September, leading to 233 deaths and nearly $90 billion in damage. The bulk of the damage and casualties took place in Tennessee, Georgia, Florida and the Carolinas.
