Operation BBQ Relief
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Tornados, Hurricanes, Floods and Wildfires wreak havoc on people's lives. On May 22, 2011, Joplin, Missouri was hit with a catastrophic tornado that killed 161 people. The damage from this most costly tornado in U.S. History was over $2.8 billion. Among the first responders was a group of barbecue pitmasters and competition BBQ cooks who worked together to feed the victims and other first responders. Operation BBQ Relief was born.
The Story
A band of barbecue brothers saw the need to form an organization to be able to serve hot barbecue meals after devastating events in the future and named the organization Operation BBQ Relief (OBR). Shortly thereafter, the group knew that they would need more BBQ cooking equipment to handle these mass feedings and contacted Ole Hickory Pits. Ole Hickory Pits responded to their request for help by donating a large BBQ Pit mounted on a trailer.
Since then, Ole Hickory Pits has added numerous pits to OBR’s fleet of mobile BBQ Pits. We are so very proud of all of the thousands of BBQ Hero Volunteers and leaders that have since that time served over 3,000,000 hot BBQ meals to other victims in many locations throughout the United States. Most recently, OBR had its first deployment feeding victims of the hurricane that devastated the Bahamas, outside of the U.S. continent.
American Royal 2014
Ole Hickory Pits has been helping Operation BBQ Relief for many years as seen from this photo taken in October, 2014.
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