Disaster Relief

“I’ve never seen anything like this.” This was probably the most used sentence over the past two weeks in Pike County. The amount of damage that this flood did was unbelievable. I’ve never responded to a flood clean up before and this certainly was an eye opening experience. Many homes were just washed away, trailers were floating down the road like boats on a river. There were also numerous houses that were moved off their foundations. Many of the survivors that we helped out were just happy to be alive and grateful to have any help that we could offer. The first house we got to clean out was the home of a young couple with two little girls and probably the most heartbreaking thing I heard was when the dad picked up a baby doll that was soaked and covered in mud and all he said was “this is what hurts me.” This flood came so quickly that many people were lucky to just get out of their homes, let alone think about trying to save any personal items. One woman we spoke to said she just went out to dinner and when she came home there was water everywhere and she was gone maybe an hour. But just as quickly as the water rose it went down just as fast.

A lot of the clean up that CAP’s Disaster Relief did was removing mud from the homes, removing drywall and any damaged floors or carpet. In the two weeks that I was at Disaster Relief our crew worked on about 8 different homes, some houses we spent a few days at cleaning up while others were just a couple of hours. It has definitely been a tiring two weeks, but the gratitude we received from the homeowners definitely outweighed the long days. CAP wrapped up its efforts on Saturday, but there is a lot more work to be done and they are hoping to return in the next few months to do some more cleanup. So please keep Pike County in your prayers and thoughts.

Kate Stefanowicz is a long-term volunteer in CAP’s Housing Program. You can see more of her Disaster Relief photos here.