MYRTLE BEACH, SC (WBTW) – The National Guard is stationed all throughout parts of Horry County to help with the hurricane aftermath and flooding, but when Carolina Forest residents learned some soldiers were staying at their community’s recreation center, they wanted to say thank you in a big way.
Mellissa Montgomery had visited the soldiers one day, and posted to her Facebook friends about getting together to cook them dinner. The post quickly caught hundreds of other Carolina Forest residents’ attentions.
“It went from 20 friends to the whole community,” Montgomery said.
Around 300 neighbors arrived with food for the National Guard on Wednesday afternoon.
David Flynn, a resident in the Sawgrass East development was helping unload the food donations for the soldiers at the recreation center.
“My brother made pulled pork, and he’s been working on that all day, so he brought it down and dropped it off, so I just figured I’d do my part and volunteer here for a while,” Flynn said.
The soldiers say they were told people would be making them dinner, however, they never anticipated such a large turnout.
“When it started, everybody just kept coming and coming, and we would load up to the other soldiers, and more people just kept coming and coming, so the community has been outstanding,” Sgt Sheronda Dean from the National Guard said.
Sgt Dean is helping to organize efforts to get the leftover food to the rest of the soldiers stationed in Horry County. She says there are groups in Conway, working on 501 and in Myrtle Beach.
“(The food) boosts morale, because they’re out in the heat, now they can have great meals, and it just makes you work harder,” Dean said. “Everybody appreciated it. We’re really enjoying the food, and that was very nice, thank you.”
Carolina Forest volunteers are also bringing some of the extra food to around six local fire stations.
