Crews break out unique vehicles to respond in the aftermath of Francine

Storm chaser Aaron Rigsby reported from Louisiana on Sept. 12 as crews worked nonstop to respond to the damage left behind by Hurricane Francine.

Transcript

00:00These stories are best told with people who are on the ground storm chasers people like Aaron Rigsby

00:05Who have experienced this storm?

00:07And Aaron, I know that you've been chasing storms for a long time here

00:11Severe weather in the plains typically tornadoes very different tracking a hurricane making landfall

00:17What was this experience like for you and how did it go over the past couple days?

00:23Yeah, absolutely correct jeff

00:24So the thing about hurricanes is that there's so much more preparation that goes into it because you have to be prepared

00:30For being stuck for long periods of time gas shortages

00:33You have to stock up on extra food water and supplies

00:35Versus tornadoes and other events where you don't necessarily have to plan quite as substantially for because it's over such a small area

00:43Hurricanes as we've seen over the recent years are a very widespread area

00:46And that's exactly what we saw with this hurricane now on my way making my way west

00:51I did notice that a lot of those gas lines were really starting to stack up

00:54From people making their way from areas like homa which continues to not have power this evening

01:00Over to these western and eastern cities to be able to top off their fuel and get some extra for the weeks to come

01:05Because the power is inevitably going to be out for several days

01:09Now the thing that i'm going to remember most about this one is that a lot of times hurricanes you typically hear about the calm

01:14Eye, that's not the case with this one

01:15And it was interesting because I think some of the higher wind gusts I had were actually

01:19Inside of the eye of this hurricane and that was partially due to the wind shear that it was dealing with which

01:25If there's any good news to say about it was keeping the intensity at bay from getting stronger upon landfall

01:31And Aaron, I saw some pretty unique vehicles there that you captured from drone

01:35So in this part of the country, it's not easy to get around here

01:39We have the bayous. We have a lot of uh areas that that may take on water in big ways at certain times

01:45So, uh, what what kind of vehicles have you been seeing from maybe first responders or the utility companies?

01:51Yeah, absolutely around this area

01:53They have to bring in some big interesting machinery because as you said a lot of these communities are in the bayous

01:59So some of these homes can be hard to access and there's very limited roads

02:03So they use these track vehicles to be able to gain access to those homes

02:07To check on people and perform rescue missions if necessary from people stranded in their homes

02:12If they got into a bad situation not something we typically see a little bit further east into florida and to alabama

02:19East into florida and to alabama and mississippi because there's a lot more access to those homes versus the bayous of louisiana

02:25Which it's very good that they have those on standby. Yeah, pretty fascinating stuff

02:28We're looking at some of your drone videography right now

02:30Very different from what you might see in maybe omaha nebraska or something like that after a storm storm chaser. Aaron rigsby

02:37Thanks again for all you've done over the past few days and be safe