Saturday morning, March 22, the devastating Oso landslide hit in our back yard and over 30 homes were destroyed. It seems that all of us know at least one person who has been affected by the slide. Darrington Fire Department has worked as incident command and many volunteers have been looking for survivors since Saturday. An estimated 90 people are missing with 35 unaccounted for.  Nevertheless, our little town is in shock over this tragic event.

Arlington High School ASB is raising money for the slide victims all week. As well as DECA who is giving all their lunch profits to Red Cross.  Elizabeth Roth is the manager of the DECA student store “We have seen mad crowds all day and sold out of most everything before second lunch even started”. Day one donations equal $1248. $600 from DECA and $648 from ASB. All of the money will be giving to the Red Cross to help the family’s affected by the slide. The Art Club sold t-shirts to aid the victims as well.

Our little town has had a massive amount of media attention over the past week.  Downtown is filed with news trucks as well as Red Cross and homeland security have lined up on Olympic street. Driving through the town you can’t escape the attention. An entire cell tower was set up behind Haller Middle School yesterday for media communications. FEMA has moved into the old A building on French Street and is storing equipment on the Haller Middle School grounds. Our town has be extremely helpful to slide victims. Business all over the town such as Moe’s espresso and New Beginnings Thrift Shop have be donating money and clothes all week to victims in need. Not to mention donations coming in from across the world.

Truly, this tragic event has brought or community closer together and reinforced the strength of our community.