Florida residents with Jackson County ties impacted by Hurricane Michael

0

Amanda Heller, a 2005 graduate of Brownstown Central High School, has lived in Florida for four years.

While working at an elementary school in Crawfordville on Monday, the principal came over the intercom around noon saying school would be canceled the rest of the week.

The Wakulla County area, which is 10 minutes from the state capital of Tallahassee, was going to be hit by the center of Hurricane Michael.

“The storm seemed to just come out of nowhere,” Heller said. “It was a tropical storm this weekend, so nobody really thought anything about the tropical storm, so we went to school Monday.”

The principal told the staff they would meet later that day, but that changed when he realized the storm had become a hurricane.

And not a small hurricane, as it hit landfall Wednesday as a Category 4 storm. Weather forecasts were calling for potentially catastrophic winds reaching 150 mph, up to a foot of rain and up to 14 foot storm surge, making it the most powerful storm on record to hit the area.

Former Seymour resident Rick Wilson and his family fled their residence near Port St. Joe, Florida, on Monday. With five young children, they weren’t going to risk the dangers of staying even though some of the residents in their neighborhood did, he said.

“It came up so quick,” Wilson said of the hurricane Wednesday morning while driving from Alabama to Indiana. “Usually, you have a week to prepare for these things.”

Wilson said he didn’t learn about Hurricane Michael until Sunday night, when his wife, Teresa, called him while he was doing a show. Retired from The Alley ministry in Seymour, Wilson now makes a living performing music at different venues in Florida.

He’s afraid they may have nothing to go back to after the storm.

“All we can do is pray and hope for the best,” he said.

The Wilsons were planning to wait out the storm for a few days at a hotel in Troy, Alabama, but once they realized how bad it was going to get, those plans changed.

They left Alabama on Wednesday morning to head to Seymour.

“Everything we own is there,” he said of their home in Port St. Joe. “We have one suitcase filled with clothes and our van, which had my music equipment in it. But the most important thing is we got the kids out and we’re safe.”

This was the first hurricane the family has experienced since moving to Florida in February.

“Every day is paradise,” he said. “We live a half a block from the beach, so you can see the ocean from our house, but paradise is turning to disaster.”

With plans to bunk at his sister’s home, Wilson said all they can do is live one day at a time.

“We just trust God to provide,” he said. “The kids don’t understand the gravity of it. This has truly uprooted us, but what do you do?”

Heller said she was in Florida for Hurricane Hermine in 2016, which was a Category 2. She and her husband, Jon, had a young child then, and they were out of electricity for a couple of days.

“We just moved down there, so we didn’t have any generators, so we were pretty miserable,” she said.

As Michael recently strengthened to a hurricane and reached Category 4, Amanda said she decided to return to her hometown of Brownstown with her two young kids.

“I took the boys on Monday night, and we drove up to Indiana just so that we would have air conditioning, running water and TVs for the boys,” she said.

Jon had to stay behind because he works for the Florida Department of Transportation in the emergency area. He is working alongside Gov. Rick Scott.

“They are sending out generators if anybody needs it,” Amanda said. “They monitor the roads and the power outages and all of that.”

Amanda said Jon got off work at 6:30 a.m. Wednesday and planned to go back in at 7 p.m. that day.

“It is very hard, especially right now because he’s sleeping and I can’t really communicate with him,” she said late Wednesday morning. “It’s really hard on our children. Our oldest wants to be with their dad. I just have to tell him that Dad’s helping other people, he’s keeping people safe. I told him he’s a hero. He doesn’t understand why he couldn’t stay with his dad.”

On the other hand, Amanda said it gives her peace of mind knowing Jon is safe and he is able to watch their house. She said they already lost electricity, and Jon had boarded up the windows and moved outdoor items indoors.

When they left Monday afternoon, Amanda said the weather was calm, but it was hot outside. Traffic was heavy because of mandatory evacuations in the lowland area, a Walmart store was closed and stores were running out of gas and bottled water.

“You know it’s bad when Walmart closes,” Amanda said.

Recently talking to her neighbor, Amanda was told the wind was starting to pick up.

“We’re expecting the rain and the wind, and I think everybody is worried about the storm surges,” she said.

Jon is in a location with backup generators, so he can go to work and have access to air conditioning and a place to take a shower and eat.

“He’s going to be OK as far as being provided for and trying to make it through the hurricane,” Amanda said.

Depending on how bad the storm gets, she said she hopes to return to Florida on Saturday. Since she wasn’t sure of the severity of the storm, Amanda said she didn’t take many personal belongings with her.

“At that time, I didn’t think it would be a big deal,” she said. “Now, I’m going through my mind thinking of everything we could lose that isn’t replaceable. It’s just a house, they are just material things, but it’s hard. Those sentimental things are hard to think about losing.”

No posts to display