Some Irma Evacuees Remain at Talladega Superspeedway
Though most of the roughly 200 Irma evacuees from Florida have left Talladega Superspeedway, about 60 people in recreational vehicles remain.
Superspeedway public relations director Russell Branham says the facility provided temporary refuge in the form of gravel slots for RVs and grass areas for tents, with water hookups and food.
Having already fled their homes, most of the original evacuees left the Speedway to escape what’s now Tropical Storm Irma, which made landfall in Florida as a powerful hurricane originally predicted to track farther to the east. Instead, it followed the evacuees north-northwest from Florida to Alabama, where as of Monday afternoon, rain and wind was already beginning to pick up.
Branham said a small number of the families saw that things were not as bad as forecasted at their homes, so they headed back south to check for damages, and “just to be home.”
All of the people originally in tents had left the campsites at the Speedway as of Sunday. They’re staying at nearby Eastaboga Baptist Church through Tuesday.
Everything has been free of charge.
“We were glad to help,” says Branham. “We’ve got the property, we’ve got the facilities, so why not do it?”
He says local churches and chambers of commerce also helped by providing and grilling food at the Speedway.
Rescuers run oxygen to survivors in Indonesia school building collapse
Rescuers ran oxygen and water to students trapped in the unstable concrete rubble of a collapsed school building in Indonesia, as they worked to free survivors Tuesday, a day after the structure fell.
YouTube agrees to pay Trump $24 million to settle lawsuit over Jan. 6 suspension
YouTube is the latest social media company to pay Trump tens of millions of dollars to resolve lawsuits brought before he returned to power. The money will fund a new ballroom at the White House.
From painting to producing: Birmingham DJ Andrea Really releases first album
Birmingham DJ Andrea Really wasn't always a music producer. She used to be a prolific painter. But when her art studio burned down in 2017, she pivoted careers. Really spoke with WBHM about that journey upon the release of her first album this summer, called Zeitgeist.
A year after Helene, a group of raft guides embarks on a river clean-up mission
A popular rafting river in the Appalachian mountains is still closed a year after Hurricane Helene, because there's just too much debris. Now, rafting guides have come together to help clean it up.
Lesotho’s Famo music: from shepherd songs to gang wars
In Lesotho, a style of traditional accordion music called Famo has become entangled with deadly gang rivalries. Once the soundtrack of shepherds and migrant workers, today it's linked to killings, government bans — and a fight over cultural identity.
Comic Cristela Alonzo grew up in fear of border patrol. ICE has ‘brought it all back’
For the first seven years of her life, Alonzo lived in an abandoned diner in a south Texas border town. Her new Netflix stand-up special is called Upper Classy.