GRAND BAY -- As traffic rumbled along nearby Interstate 10, a long, insect-like orange helicopter rose into the air carrying a 7.5-ton section of reinforced fiberglass pipe. It hovered waiting for police cars a mile to the east and west to slow traffic enough to create a 200-foot-wide, vehicle-free gap across the busy expressway.

The gap appeared, and in moments the aircraft and its cargo had sailed over the interstate, headed for an open field beside the city docks in Bayou La Batre.

So began a more than 12-hour workday Wednesday, as a helicopter crew, state and local police and others coordinated the air delivery of 25 chimney liner sections -- built by Grand Bay's newly arrived Erishigs Inc. -- to the Bayou's city docks for a planned July 18 barge trip to a power plant in Newburgh, Ind.

"The real story here is not these cans we're flying out today. This is about a company and its people bouncing back from Hurricane Katrina," said Rod Courtney, vice president in charge of field operations for Ershigs Inc.

Courtney stood among more than 100 guests, many of them Ershigs' own plant workers, who watched the helicopter work as they chatted and ate a catered breakfast under the shade of a white canopy Wednesday. A sound system played a bevy of carefree songs like "Tequila" by The Champs and Chubby Checker's "The Twist."

Two years ago, Wednesday's celebrations might have seemed a faraway dream to workers at Ershigs' Biloxi operation. In late August 2005, the dockside facility was blindsided by the worst natural disaster in American history, Hurricane Katrina, and forced to find a new home.

Earlier that year, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency had instituted its Clean Air Interstate Rule, which requires coal-fired power plants to reduce emissions of the pollutants nitrogen oxide and sulfur dioxide.

This created massive demand for large-scale scrubber systems, which require exactly the type of pipe linings manufactured by Ershigs. Faced with a multimillion-dollar backlog, the operation's parent company, Houston-based Denali Inc., began searching for a new Ershigs site.

Denali officials decided in October 2005 to acquire Lape Industrial Fiberglass Inc., a Grand Bay company whose facility just off Interstate 10 was nestled in a clearing surrounded by live oaks.

The Biloxi site had a dock facility, but the new site is more than a 10-mile drive from the nearest Gulf access, said Tom Pilcher, Ershigs' president, who is based in Tulsa, Okla., but attended Wednesday's celebration. The company's leaders decided to solve the problem by hiring Central Point, Oregon-based Erickson Air-Crane.

The aircraft working Wednesday was an Erickson S-64F Air-Crane, built by Erickson Air-Crane. It is nearly identical to a Sikorsky S-64F, originally a Sikorsky Aircraft product. Erickson bought the helicopter's type certificate and manufacturing rights in 1992, company officials said.

Sydney Howard stood in an air-conditioned container filled with personnel supplies a few hundred feet from the tent where breakfast was being served Wednesday. The Ocean Springs resident started working for Ershigs four months before Katrina, and now works as the company's equipment man.

"There was nowhere to work after Hurricane Katrina. Even Ershigs wasn't there anymore," Howard said. "But they kept paying us anyway. They never skipped a paycheck."

Howard is one of the 15 or so employees from south Mississippi who decided to stay on with Ershigs after the move to Grand Bay, even though it increased his commute from 10 miles to more than 30. "I've never worked for a company this loyal before. I'm going to stick with them."

The company originally planned to deliver the fiberglass linings directly to a barge at the Bayou La Batre city docks, but the barge has been delayed, said R.L. "Bo" Povilat, head of estimating and contracts at Ershigs in Grand Bay.

The company and the city of Bayou La Batre initially signed a three-day contract, at $2,500 a day, to rent the dock space. Monday, the City Council approved a 24-day extension to the contract at a cost of $1,500 a day. The city will be paid a total of $43,500, according to the contract.

To load the chimney sections onto the barge, the company plans to transport its own cranes to the Bayou La Batre city docks when the barge arrives on July 18, Povilat said.

A thunderstorm caused a temporary helicopter shutdown late Wednesday afternoon, but the company finished delivering all the cans to the Bayou by sundown, Povilat said.

DAUPHIN ISLAND

DAUPHIN ISLAND -- It's a place where majestic brown pelicans swoop through the sky, searching for dinner or a new place to perch. It's a place where traffic lights don't clutter the scenery, where you can ride a bike for miles or sample fresh-from-the-Gulf seafood at a handful of local eateries.

While Hurricane Katrina redistributed much of the west end's sand and property nearly two years ago, there are still homes, condos and hotel rooms available for rent here.

There's also plenty to do to keep a family busy. There's historic Fort Gaines to explore, sea life to discover at the Estuarium, homegrown produce to sample at a Saturday farmer's market at Cadillac Square, fish to catch at Cedar Point or kites to fly at the public beach.

Besides hosting one of the country's top fishing rodeos and the world's longest one-day sailboat race, Dauphin Island remains a mostly quiet strip of sand and tall pines about three miles off the coast of south Alabama. It's located about 35 miles south of Mobile.

Once the capital of the Louisiana Territory, it was first known to French explorers as Massacre Island in the early 1700s because of large piles of human bones found there. About a decade later, the name was changed to Dauphine.

The island was accessible only by boat or aircraft until 1955, when a bridge was built, linking the spot to the Fowl River community and the rest of southern Mobile County. In 1979, that span was destroyed when Hurricane Frederic blasted the isle into three parts, toppling dunes and homes. Its newest bridge was completed in 1982.

With habitats ranging from freshwater lakes to maritime forests, Dauphin Island has been praised in national publications including Coastal Living magazine for its importance as a birding site for spring migration. Brown and white signs dot the island, letting birders know the best places to see all manner of fowl.

Some upcoming events scheduled for this summer include fireworks after sunset on the Fourth of July. The 75th annual Alabama Deep Sea Fishing Rodeo is slated for July 20-22 with more than $400,000 in cash and prizes available. Check out the Web site www.adsfr.com for more details.

The Estuarium is the public aquarium of the Dauphin Island Sea Lab, Alabama's marine education and research center. Visitors can explore four key ecosystems of coastal Alabama -- the Delta, Mobile Bay, barrier islands and the Gulf of Mexico -- through interactive exhibits, films, and well-trained docents. Those who happen to be there at feeding time can even watch tiny sea horses dine on even smaller bits of frozen shrimp.

The Estuarium, which features a well-stocked gift shop, is open daily, except for some winter and spring holidays. For up-to-date hours of operation and admission prices, visit the Web site: www.estuarium.disl.org or call 1-866-403-4409.

For current weather and fishing reports, visit the island's official Web site: www.townofdauphinisland.org.