John Gumm's Story

John Gumm was the meteorologist for WWL-TV. He was broadcasting until Sunday, August 28 — the day before the storm hit — when his wife went into labor. His first son, Connor, was born at 3:20 AM on Monday August 29 in a Slidell hospital, which was pretty much ground zero for the storm. It has been reported that at one point, in the middle of reporting the path of the storm , WWL-TV anchor Eric Paulson interrupted John and said "would you just leave, already?" in an attempt to get him to go home to Slidell while he still could and take care of his wife.

They survived Katrina at the hospital, and immediately after the storm, John returned to his Slidel home, only to find a tree had come through it and allowed rain to saok everything. Gathering up what he could, he returned to the hospital. With no electricity, and declining services, he packed up his new born son (who required special needs attention) and wife and drove to Nashville. After getting the condition of his son stabilized, they drove on to Michigan, to join family that lives there.

John has decided to leave WWL-TV. The following is part of his departing message:

Rest assured, we will visit. We have too many great friends here not to. And I promise all of you Connor will grow up knowing what Mardi Gras is all about. He will understand the center grassy area down the middle of a highway is not a median but a neutral ground. He’ll know what lagniappe means. He’ll love seafood gumbo and red beans and rice (or at least try it because his daddy loves it). He’ll also know how to pronounce Tchoupitoulas….that I promise you. And when he asks about the big hurricane that he was born in, he will know that his daddy did the most important work he will ever again do in his career on the Saturday before he was born and he will also know the people that his daddy worked with and the people that daddy was talking to through their television sets were some of the greatest that he has ever come across. And when we visit New Orleans, he will walk through a beautiful, historic city with the most advanced flood control system in the world and he will stare in disbelief at the old pictures of his favorite city daddy took from way back in 2005 realizing that the city he knows is now a much better and safer place than the city his daddy knew when he was a young meteorologist doing the most important work he ever did on Rampart Street….way back in 2005.

You can read the entire post at http://www.wwltv.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=23837.