Interview with Tealcie Annibles (Tealcie Resident) of SL Regional Search and Rescue.

By Bixyl Shuftan

Recently, Gemma Cleanslate wrote about an exercise of the Second Life Regional Search And Rescue group. They are led by Tealcie Annibles (Tealcie Resident). I recently met up with her at their headquarters in Euryalus. Of the radio stream, besides music there were occasional "weather reports" describing sim lag and other glitches.

I asked Tealcie about how she first found out about Second Life. She told me, "Back in about 2006ish, I heard the buzz and came to have a look.   I had a terrible connection and ancient computer and of the nine or so days I was involved I spent maybe 45 minutes in world and the rest trying to get in.  It was horrid. I forgot all about it until December of 2017. I was in a store doing some Christmas shopping and two young ladies were in the checkout ahead of me and one said 'I don't know how you do it I still can't even find my left shoe.'  And the other laughed and replied, 'Well That's Second Life.'" That got me interested and I came for round two, fell in love and stayed." She had come back because of a casual conversation about it in real life.

"I spent the first week figuring things out," Tealcie continued, "rented a quarter region and learned terraforming and such and then bought a private region. That became too limiting. So I dumped the adult region and came mainland. Here, the story gets good.   I was naive to the ways of this world and immediately albeit inadvertently, ticked off a bunch of people. I ran afoul of my own ambition.  I quickly bought land and built thirteen bases all around the world. My meteoric rise from unknown to omnipresent, combined with some really ugly builds , (laughter) , seemed to get under peoples skin. My error finally dawned on me. So I dumped back down to one base for awhile. I survived a griefing that even Linden Governance called 'epic' , and I stayed low for awhile after that. Then apparently not having learned my lesson I began to build again."

I asked about what could a griefer do that would get attention of the Lindens. She answered, "Oh it was a really cool grief. Imagine your most used item, In this case my logo with white background.  It was everywhere: signs, flags, etc. This grief intercepted the UUID and changed the image to one of the griefers choosing and it only affected me.   Everyone else saw the logo. I saw a woman flipping me off. Linden Lab said it was impossible until I proved it to them by forcing them to enter my account and do some photographic work real time. After that, I have no idea what they did. But within three weeks it was over. I named my mystery griefer The Gaslight Griefer    and I'm somewhat honored to have drawn out such an epic attack."

Tealcie went back to the Search and Rescue group, "All this time since coming mainland the SLR-SAR group has floated along.  It's just a few people having fun." She had founded the group herself, "I just wanted a way to enjoy the things I love with other people   flying, boating, climbing, exploring. I figured create a group and hopefully attract like-minded folks." Since the group's start, "We have hovered around thirty members with varied participation. I try to create fun events and time them so everyone around the real-life globe can attend at a decent hour. I usually bite the bullet with the 2 AM SLT slot  on Sunday morning which works out to about 8 PM down under.  So everyone around the clock can attend and still get to bed for work Monday. It really depends on the scale of the diasater being staged."

I brought up Gemma's article of the train wreck, and asked about other examples. Tealcie listed a few more, "We crashed a 757 into an oil platform out on Gaeta V, punched a DC-9 into a hillside in central Sansara, another harbor fire on Corsica, various ship sinkings around the Blake (Sea). This next weekend should be a hoot.  I'm using the rental region Iridium again but no spoilers on the actual disaster. I have found first responders like the real time call for mutual aid with no heads up. All our events are set to public rez so first responders from any agency have no trouble getting their equipment out."

I asked which exercise was the most challenging to set up. She answered, "Most challenging?  The 757 had (an) airliner, oil platform, and underwater elements.  It was fairly intense in detail. This last build, I had great help from Lale who rocked the train tracks and tunnels and did a great job dangling the cars. This upcoming disaster will be pretty intense as well."

I asked how long does it take to plan an exercise and set one up? Tealcie answered, "Planning is usually just a five minute brainstorming.  Dasha came up with the train wreck we saw last month and it was penciled out in minutes. The build has to be done in two days as the regions are a three day rental. I generally terraform and rough it out Friday evening then do the build Saturday night after work.  We encourage the public to attend and I think one of the best ways to watch the event is to jump into a victim position and cam around while hamming it up awaiting rescue.  Watch, Participate and have fun."

And where does Tealcie and the group get their ideas for their drills? She responded, "Well, the ideas come from lots of people and places.  I take the ideas, mix in some pure evil like booby traps, landslides, explosions and just have a blast, pun intended. I try to give the first responder community a challenging, but winnable fight. These events are really about the community not SLR-SAR.  We put them on for everyone to come together and represent their home groups and work together doing what they love. The more different tags I see the happier I am." I asked if any of the ideas came from movies and television. She answered, "More from the real lives of people who have witnessed tragedies.  The commuter train wreck was something close to home for Dasha.  And yes some media stories of disasters ignite ideas as well. I try to tailor the events to our community strengths too.  The SLIAFF member agencies are all well equipped for fires fought from air, land and sea so there is always a fire element. My people enjoy technical rescues and heavy extraction situations. SAREMSUK group are extreme flying and airborne specialists and frankly Sophie and her SAR EMS UK group are the bar we wish to reach someday. There is a vibrant first responder community here in SL and I'm the new kid on the block just trying to do my part for that community."

Recalling some people can be stickers for realism, I asked how difficult were the helicopters to fly. Tealcie answered,  "Well, there are three basic levels of helicopters in Second Life. The first level are extremely simple to fly. The middle level are a little more difficult and offer a bit of realism. Then there are the SA helicopters. Kelly Shergood and her team construct very realistic expert level helicopters. I lack the skill required to fly the SA helis into rescues yet, but there are many who would not fly anything else.  SAREMSUK for instance use the SA built Sikorsky 92  to great effect." How much practice do those need? Tealcle told me quite a bit, "Practice, patience, and possibly even expert instruction.  They are the pinnacle of Second Life Helicopters. Several of my members have the requisite skills.  Lia and Alma both totally rock the SA helis. As for learning SL Helicopters I start people on the middle tier and can generally have a student flying in 10-15 minutes. I do it that way so people don't give up by being defeated by the expert level helis. Get the basics down, then move up a step.

"And there is so much to learn along the way that doesn't involve flying. The EMS gear in Second Life is phenomenal. Also you need to swim, climb, be injured, scuba, drive, and operate equipment. First responding is one of the more intense pursuits in SL. Fortunately we are blessed with creators who 'get it' and build amazing gear and vehicles. ... I have several builders I contract with and I am slowly bringing responder gear to the community filling niches where gear is needed.   That's not at all easy since there is already so much here.  But as I find things missing, I get my builders working on the items. Like our operational Jaws of life-esque cutter and pry tools. They are designed to aid in roleplay at extraction scenes."

As the interview drew to a close, I asked Tealcie what else she had to say. She answered, "I'd like to see the community grow.  And I hope my no tag required events promoting pride in whatever group you represent, helps along those lines.   There are still some groups who demand you belong to no other groups to belong to theirs.  It seems exclusionary.   I say I don't care what group or groups you belong to you don't have to join mine to play.  Jump right in.  Represent whoever and have fun. I got that philosophy from SLIAFF and the way they run their mutual aid responses.   Numerous agencies respond and work with a common purpose.  I am trying to spread that wisdom across the entire first responder community. I wish I could take credit for the idealism but I'm just repeating what I have learned here from people with double-digit SL ages who learned themselves through trial and error.

"I'd like to add that SLR-SAR is an open group and free to join.  You do not have to leave your current group to join us and you are free to leave and return to your hearts content.  But the main thing is you don't have to join the group at all to participate so be sure to watch your frequencies Sunday the 22nd for that mutual aid call and come have some fun."

And with that, the interview came to a close. A few days later on Sunday September 22, the SL Regional Search And Rescue was one of the two groups that took part in a large exercise in Iridium. And this was a disaster of epic scale, an ocean liner that collided with an oil rig resulting in fires and the potential of a massive explosion. Tealcie tool part as one of the injured. But the rescuers were well equipped. Despite a mishap or two due to lag, the exercise went well. Cleanup was soon after, so what was left were screenshots and memories to talk about with one another and friends. And of course they would soon be planning for the next disaster.

Bixyl Shuftan

Resident from Puerto Rico Back Online Two Months After Hurricane

By Bixyl Shutan

This year's hurricane season was a destructive one. Hurricane Harvey would affect a number of residents when it slammed into Texas and Louisiana in late August. But this would not be the only hurricane to wreck havoc on Americans. On September 20, Hurricane Maria slammed into the territory of Puerto Rico, which had already suffered damage from Hurricane Irma a couple weeks earlier. The result was devastating. Officially, the number of people who were killed by the storm is 55, although there are suggestions the death toll was much higher. For the power grid, which was already in bad shape, the storm was the finishing blow. Practically the entire island lost power, with estimates that some parts could be without electricity for as long as six months. When it turned out that a company contracted to rebuild the power grid had only two full-time workers, the move to cancel it added to delays.

For Second Life resident Serenity Stahlwalkur (AyameAkemiSakura Resident), the disaster was personal as she herself lives in Puerto Rico. Seeing she was online after weeks, I contacted her, and she and I talked about what had happened, "My home flooded ... over 5 feet of water. I was asleep when it was filling, 3 feet, almost drowned. ... Ihad to sleep in a high chair 'till (the) water drained at 5 AM. That was when the National Guard came." Once she could get back to her house, "me and Mom cleaned the place and salvaged what we could." She blamed the flooding on city government, "was the mayor's fault that the sections were flooded. He didn't clean the gutters or the channels before the storm. ... for the water to flow down to the sea. It deviated to the urban area, taking bridges and a few homes and cars with it ... plus the storm surge pushing salt water. ... They had to open the dam's doors and it flooded the 5th, 6th, and 7th sections."

"Overall, been bad here. ... broken trees, fences, houses, collapsed power lines, power poles on the (ground) broken. ... Mentally I'm still stressed out, had a few accidents. ... I cracked and fractured both of my ankles cleaning the devastated back yard. ... Plus one of my pups was run over by a car. She survived, but badly injured." When I asked how many stores and businesses remained open, Serenity answered, "None, the stores were damaged and flooded, between 6 and 7 feet of water." She and her neighbors had gotten supplies at "the National Emergency Center, and the Army convoys came to give water and food." The first stores and businesses nearby would open "a few weeks after. Power came back the 20th of November," with Internet shortly afterwards, and running water about a month ago. But power, and her Internet connection, are still less than reliable. More needs to be done "to stable the communications and net," as well as more cleaning up.

Serenity stated it was about a month before she had gotten more or less used to life without the Internet, "though as for power, I was going nuts. The dark nights were too depressing." Of how the storms, damage, and long outage will change things for the long term, she felt, "This hurricane changed everyone, some for the good, some for the bad." Some would leave the island and move to the mainland United States. Of her plans in Second Life now that she's back, "Well, my plan is go back to my old life (here) and start over, a new chapter."

Sources: Wikipedia, CNN, Wired, New York Times 

Bixyl Shuftan

Addition: More links about the hurricane's aftermath.

http://www.courant.com/news/connecticut/hc-puerto-rico-relief-day-2-20171127-htmlstory.html

http://www.courant.com/community/manchester/hc-ugc-article-hartford-foundations-respond-rebuild-renew-2017-12-05-story.html
 

Hurricane Irene Stories from Second Life

No other country is as heavily represented in Second Life as the United States, and millions make their homes near the East Coast. So when Hurricane Irene smashed onto the coast on August 27th and 28th with it’s wind, rain, and flooding, many of us were affected in one way or another.

Among those in the path of the storm, yours truly. And remembering Hurricane Isabelle several years ago knocking out power for a week, I was worried this would happen again. So I made sure I had enough canned food & bread, batteries for the flashlights, gasoline for the generator, and uploaded a few articles onto the Newser ahead of time. I also had a number of books to read, plus pencil & paper if I wanted to write (or draw).

On the day of the hurricane was dark skies, thick clouds, and the strong breeze made the trees sway when I looked out the window. And the rain, at times it fell normally, others heavily, and water pooled in places in my yard. I basically hunkered down at my house, watching the local news and going about my business on the computer, keeping in touch with friends in Second Life, not sure if I’d be knocked offline at any moment. The storm was its windiest about 3-6PM SL time (6-9 PM local time), but power stayed on until a bit after 6:00, just when I was starting to think it might not fail.

But power wasn’t out for long. Before sunrise, I woke to the sounds and sights of power coming back on. And it stayed on. In the morning, I went outside and saw no damage but fallen tree branches, which I spent about an hour cleaning up. I wouldn’t be spending a week offline after all. But it wasn’t that long ago I had to spend a lot of money to fix up the house, including cracks in the ceiling that came about after a bad storm. It’s possible the storm might have shaken the house up for future problems down the road.

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Others in Second Life had their problems. Grease Coakes lived further up the East Coast. “I didn’t go through a lot,” he told me, “it was just windy and rainy. I stayed inside, ... with food supplies I was fine. My neighbors didn’t think much of it. They were more unnerved by the earthquake. ... I’m used to rainy weather, but in all my life, that was my first earthquake.I thought the hurricane was overhyped by the media. It might have been worse in other areas, but here it was no big deal.” Grease lived some distance inland.

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SL Newser reporter Gemma Cleanslate was in the hurricane’s path in the northeast, “No wind or rain damage, but power out for about ten hours.” But many tens out thousands nearby were without power, “The town next to me, (power) will not be up for a week, they said. ... Our library was *full* of people to say, charging cell phones, just hanging around (chuckle) people we never saw before.”

“I think Vermont is really suffering, never expected this massive flooding. And the Connecticut River is going going to flood a lot. One farmer, a woman, who is about 45, took over her dad’s farming a few years ago and if the river floods her fields in the meadows, it will be devastation to all the corn down there. She had a bad harvest last year. This may be her last.” The farm was near where Gemma worked,”She almost quit then.” Later, Gemma told me the field was a total loss, “My farmer lady lost all her corn in the meadows. First timt I have had no corn for Labor Day weekend.”

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Reporter Xymbers Slade was also in the northern part of the hurricane’s path. He wasn't close to shore, well inside New York state far from the ocean, but still he was affected. He didn’t lose power from the wind knocking down power lines, but from an exploding transformer. When he called to see how long it would take, he was first told by the power company they didn’t know, then was given the impression his area was considered “low priority” and might have to wait a while, possibly more than two weeks. Hearing that made him feel, “Not happy. Not happy at all.” He was able to get limited access online from his public library, but couldn’t do much more than tell his friends to wait.

Fortunately, power was restored in a few days,and he was able to log back on the Grid. Xymber's Livejournal entry can be read Here (caution, adult language).

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Perri Prinz, DJ at Sunweaver Air and Club Zero Gravity and Internet Fantasy writer featured on Book Island, also ended up losing power from Irene. “As hurricanes go,” she posted in her journal, “it wasn't terribly impressive. Basically it rained a lot, but there wasn't a lot of noisy wind like I'm used to. And we had not a bit of property damage. I had gotten about 3/4ths of the way through my show at Cutlass when the power went out, and it stayed out for three days or so. But they were rather cool days. So we didn't miss the air-conditioning.”

Perri being imaginative, she wasn’t really bored, but listened to the radio and pondered, posting a few of her thoughts in her Livejournal entry later, “Another stray thought that cropped up over the outage was how easy it was to get on without electricity. Three days to do nothing but sit and dream. ... And I wondered at those who think it would be some tragedy if we suddenly had to do without all our electrical toys - like life just couldn't go on without them. How silly.”

Eventually power did come back, and it was back to Second Life, back to Book Island, back to DJing, and back to her friends. Perri's whole post can be read Here.

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Mystery hostess Monique Corbeau lived around the New York area, and told of some of the damage there, “New York got hit bad. We had very large waves, the winds were crazy. Trees went down. No electricity yet for most of us where houses flooded. Even when it passed, we still had the winds. Most of the Island, in some spots, still no electricity. My son’s (workplace) has none. ... My husband’s (workplace) has none too. We have friends who don’t have any. My house doesn’t either, staying with family until it comes back. ... Hoping for electricity tomorrow, they said it might be days.”

“We never get hurricanes, or even tropical storms, so it was bad for us. ... The news was talking about it for days. They evacuated us fast and good.” Asked if her neighbors took it seriously and got supplies, “yeah, when you went to get supplies, there was no more. So I left being by the water and went inland to family. Just their houses were flooded. One friend in Virginia, he said tree, floods, still no power for him. A tree went through his house. ... He said thank God he was at a shelter and not home.”

“We need to be better prepared next time. So many homes destroyed, and insurance companies won’t help.” Asking her for details, “will drop you, they say. Don’t like the sound of that. They say your coverage for floods might not be covered. ... We have (flood insurance), but they said it’s for a certain kind of flood. ... That’s all the news said. I guess we’re not under flood insurance for hurricanes because we don’t get them. ... Most don’t have cell service or phones right now.”

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Live singer Debi Late, who performs in Second Life, was south of me in one of the barrier islands in North Carolina where the hurricane first hit the coast. She described details on her Facebook. Starting Thursday August 25th, she began posting about it, including weather maps of where the storm was and it’s projected path, “I'll be online as much as possible until power and/or internet service go kaflooey this weekend. We're expecting a pretty direct hit from Hurricane Irene. I'll keep you all posted on how we're doing!!” The hurricane was just one thing she posted about, others being about a cold, which caused her to cancel a show, and about the armed forces. Her friends posted her messaged wishing her well, and not to take chances, “Please be safe, Debi.” “I’ll be thinking about you.” “I’ll keep you in my thoughts and prayers.”

Although she could evacuate to away from the storm, her husband was “essential personnel,” so she stayed in the area. She did make the decision to leave her house to go to a shelter, “starting to wrap my head around packing all the important things in my house and taking them to the fire station where we will ride out Hurricane Irene. But I suspect my house will be very wet after this. So, computers/photos/scrapbooks/the works, is all getting relocated, today.”

The hurricane being downgraded got her attention, but she wasn’t taking chances, “Looks like Irene is weakening a little. But it'll still cause flooding of our area from the west. So I'm still leaving my house and hoping I don't have too big of a mess to clean up when I get home.” By evening, the move was done, “We're at the fire station now.... it started raining just a little bit, around 6 or so, nothing major here, yet. That'll happen starting in the wee hours of the morning.”

She got up early Saturday morning to check things, “We're having winds around 60 - 65 now, I'm hearing power is flickering. But this building has a generator, so we'll be ok. And the modem is on a UPS so I'm still online.” By late afternoon, water was being blown back onto the island from the west, “guess I'm going to have a wet house to return to.”

On Sunday evening, the hurricane far to the north, she posted, “We got our butts handed to us with this one. It was nasty, but we're alive. My house is flooded, but, it's stuff and wet clothes. No biggie, folks. We'll just relocate to something. Living in the fire station now. I know lots of prayers were working. Just popping in on someone else's computer ...” Two days later, she had concluded her home couldn’t be saved, “Our house is going to be a total loss, had about 2 1/2 feet of flooding in it. I'm working to salvage everything that's still dry, then we'll work on finding somewhere to live. ... This was the worst storm ever to hit our island.”

Needless to say, logging onto Second Life was out, “I won't be singing in-world for quite a while, till I'm back online and in a house at some point.”

But friends wanted to help out. Among them, “Just Because” clothing store owner Annie Melson. She posted, “Terk and I are wanting to help Debi Latte and her husband rebuild their life after the hurricane. I put up donation vendors in my store (link provided) to help Debi. EVERY cent will go to her. I'm also in the process of making a special outfit where all proceeds will go to helping Debi and her husband rebuild. Please donate! We love you, Debi!!” She was putting aside her work on her mens’ clothing for the fundraiser outfit.

I sent Annie a message asking about her helping Debi, and she later answered, “Yes, I have placed donation kiosks in my stores and another location to raise money to help Debi and her husband, and I'm creating an outfit that all proceeds from that will go to her as well. My husband, Terk, is also contacting others to help organize some special events to help bring in funds that way too. I'd like to get more kiosks out there so I'm willing to place the kiosks anywhere anyone will let me place one, and I've talked about it on my facebook page and group notices to help bring awareness. We just really want to help Debi and Mike as much as we possibly can. She's a good friend and an incredible person, and she deserves any help that can come her way.”

Annie’s store is at Taupo (60, 180, 36)

So for Debi Latte, sadly her experience with Huricane Irene is not yet over. Hopefully she’ll be able to get a new home soon. For those with a Facebook account, you can read her posts Here.

Sources: Debbi Latte's Facebook page, Symphonic Rock Productions, Xymber's Livejournal

Bixyl Shuftan

Disaster at Shelz' Haven

On Wednesday morning, the 9th of June, I rezzed onto my home land like I always do, coffee in hand. What I saw scared me--all I could see was green grass and water, not a single object could I see. I relogged, I cleared cache and relogged two more times....still the same thing.

I walked around in a state of stunned panic. Called a friend who was on line, she came to see. She was equally stunned, but she flew around (such a level head that one) and discovered that my parcel, 1/4 sim, had been raised way up above sea level. She took a pic and I was even more stunned than before, there was my land, up in the sky. She discovered that my stuff was far below where we had been standing.

She lowered the entire parcel for me to be in line with the neighbors. What I saw shocked me even more. There was the house, there was the flower bed, sans flowers. The only thing in the flower bed were the sundial, bench, a chair I had placed. All flowers were gone. The barn was gone, all the palm trees were gone. All edits to terrain for ponds and water inlets were undone.

Then, the most horrifying sight of all---ALL THE BUNNIES WERE GONE! The 100 plus bunnies and their food had VANISHED!

I walked around in a state of shock, not knowing what to do, I couldn't react exactly, couldn't cry. All I wanted to do was scream and kick and punch someone and just.....but I was too stunned to do any of those things, this was beyond my comprehension and experience in SL.

From the outside of the house, I could see the curtains were gone, but I did see a picture hanging on the wall. The wicker furniture on the front porch was gone, the lounger on the deck on the other side gone also, as well as my lounger by the water's edge. I chose not to venture in to the house at that time.

There was nothing to be done at the moment. I sent a message to the sim owner. I had to leave and face the RL job. I hoped all would resolve by the time I got home.

When I got home, I wrote a poem, as I am wont to do in times of severe stress. I went into the house. I saw the painting, one of three that were in the living room. A table and two chairs were still in tact, but the living room furniture and rug were gone. I went around all three floors, all empty, including the nude pictures I had bought at a benefit auction...POL, Lyndon, Djai and another guy whose name escapes me. All musicians.

On Saturday, the 12th of June, I logged in as usual; no rollback yet. I decided to log in as my alt. When I arrived, all the bunnies were there, the flowers, the barn, everything! My alt did not have rights (she does now!), so I decided to log back in as Shellie and give her rights to take all my stuff and give to Shellie. I relogged as Shellie and VOILA! All my stuff was restored! It was the oddest thing ... welcome to SL.

Shellie Sands