Pastor: Jamestown youth on mission trip in Duluth are safe

A mission trip from St. John’s Lutheran Church in Jamestown consisting of nine Jamestown children and three adults has been in Duluth since Sunday.

“We’re great and everybody’s mostly dry,” said the Rev. Suzi Orlopp, associate pastor with St. John’s Lutheran, who is on the mission trip. “It’s a little crazy here but we’re doing pretty well and we’re safe.”

Orlopp said there have been no issues with the building the group is staying in along with a 25-person mission group from Iowa and two other mission groups from Minnesota.

“We’re about two or three blocks from Lake Superior and we’ve been watching about six inches of water flow down the street throughout the course of the day,” she said.

Orlopp said the group’s saving grace is that the water is flowing away from where they are staying.

“The mayor here has declared a state of emergency and no travel, unless by foot,” she said. “We were at a nearby Lutheran church today and hauled hundreds of gallons of water out of its basement.”

Orlopp said the group had planned to travel to a nearby town tomorrow, but will likely be spending the day working from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. at another nearby church that has been set up as an emergency shelter.

“These kids have dealt with flooding before, so they haven’t hesitated to jump right in and help out where necessary,” she said.

Orlopp said it stopped raining heavily there in Duluth at about noon on Wednesday, but drizzled off-and-on for the rest of the day. She said they were expecting more rain Wednesday night and today.

The mission trip members were in Duluth working with the company YouthWorks, which has a station there. St. John’s Lutheran has worked with YouthWorks previously,

Orlopp said the other reasons they selected the Minnesota city was to stay relatively close to home and due to a need in the Duluth area because of what she described as “a discrepancy between the needy and the wealthy.”

They are scheduled to be in Duluth until Friday.

Sun reporter Brian Willhide can be reached at 701-952-8454 or by email at bwillhide@jamestownsun.com

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