The Aftermath of Hurricanes: A Personal Retrospective

Featured Photo: (Left to right, front row) Ben and Jo Ellen Wagner, homeowner Cora Janes, Barry Dick, Geneva Shaw, Cora’s daughter. (Back row) Bryce Jenkins and Cora’s son,  Photo by Jared Fults.

Hurricane Harvey: In the late afternoon of September 1, 2017, a letter from the First Presidency of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints appeared in email inboxes throughout Texas. It read in part:

Dear Brothers and Sisters:

The still-unfolding disaster caused by the torrential rains of Hurricane Harvey has caught the attention of people throughout the United States. Our hearts go out to the thousands who have borne the brunt of this storm, and we are deeply grateful for the acts of unselfish service and the heroic efforts of first responders that have been reported. All who find themselves amid these grave difficulties are in our prayers.

Many are expressing interest in helping the thousands of people in the stricken communities in Texas and Louisiana. We are grateful to all who wish to assist in this effort. If you want to help, please consider the following: Volunteer. Within the next few days or weeks, volunteers to assist in the massive cleanup effort will be needed.

Two weeks later on September 9^th, 2017, I along with many members of the Hurst Texas Stake drove our vehicles loaded with tools, water, food, and camping gear to spend the weekend lending a hand to those devastated by flooding in the Houston area.

Hurricane Ida: Hurricane history has a conspicuous way of repeating itself.  On September 9^th, 2021, President Tommy Hamilton 1^st counselor in the Hurst Texas stake sent out the alert and call to action email, “We have just learned that our Stake is being asked to send 35 volunteers on the weekend of Sept. 18-19 and 33-35 volunteers to assist in the Hurricane Ida clean-up.”

Having had the experience of the service to Harvey victims in 2017, my good friend Jared Fults and the young stripling and soon-to-be missionary Bryce Jenkins, managed a late Friday afternoon start for Baton Rouge. 

Knowing the hour would be late Jared Fults and I reasoned we should get our rest in a motel for the night and set up our camp the next morning before heading to our work assignment.  Opposition was all around us as sleep was made difficult by the rowdy crowd in the room next door.

As we were calling the homeowners to set up an appointment, I felt the Lord’s hand in guiding us to a special family and house for our day. Answering with ana welcoming but exhausted voice, Ms. Cora Janes agreed to meet us to survey the cleanup. The town of Destrehan was about 45 minutes away and the closer we got the downed trees and rip-blown roofs increased in number and frequency.

After 4 am prayers, we bolted from the Opelousas Motel not looking back, arriving at “Youth Legacy Duplessis Park” at three hours later to pitch our large three-man tent on the soggy soft turf of Gonzales, Louisiana.  We then rendezvoused with our other team members Ben and Jo Ellen Wagoner and gathered addresses, tools, and equipment at the Gonzales Ward Building Command Center for the work order ahead.

We parked on the narrow neighborhood road where piles of homeowner’s furnishings waited on both sides of the road to be devoured by the steel jaws of a waste recycle grab hook. A pretty African American woman in her mid-sixties introduced herself as Cora Janes. She and the team viewed the house as we discussed our options. 

Inside Jared and Bryce began to carry her ruined furniture and belongings to an already packed curbside.  Ben and Jo Ellen discussed with Cora the removal of damaged sheetrock in the ceiling. Cora’s roof had been partially tarped, but rain still dripped inside the walls.

In the backyard, a huge 70-foot Ponderosa pine tree lay parallel to the ground, and its arching horned branches 10 inches in diameter protruded through the storage shed roof.  They must have spanned the width of the back yard nearly touching the back-porch awning.

As I pull-started my 18” chainsaw, I uttered a silent prayer that the Lord would guide us in this massive effort we had taken on. The pine’s trunk was 3.5 feet diameter, and I knew I could only hack away at limbs that umbrellaed the backyard, across the property line, over the fence, and into the creek.  

Jared and Bryce finished inside and came out back to rescue me, mustering the freshly sawed 2-3-foot-long branches I had cut to the front yard.  As the humid Louisiana afternoon wore on, there were no dry patches to be found in our clothes. Cora summoned us all in to have lunch, a feast of fried chicken with a cooler of soda.

As soon as Jared and I finished arguing about the best way to attack the Ponderosa pine, Bryce interrupted saying the neighbor across the street needed help. I gulped at the thought of taking on another job, but the young stripling insisted it was important.  

The neighbor said she did not want to take us away from our work, but her husband had done all he could and proved no match for the stump that had broken off in the flower bed. Bryce grabbed a steel pry bar and a shovel and began to expose the roots below. I didn’t know why I brought my ax until then. The earth released the stump and Bryce and I on each side carried it to the street. Our new friend voiced her gratitude before shedding tears of the harrowing year she had thus far with the loss of her son and now the destruction of the hurricane. We could tell she was a woman of faith and so Bryce and I prayed with her as we stood next to the mounds of ruins on the street.

Meanwhile, Jared and the Waggoners were looking for us with a welcome message. “Reinforcements had arrived.”  “What!” I exclaimed, “Yes, 4 men and 5 boys from another stake just rolled up to help out.”  Emotion began to well up inside me as I knew the Lord had sent the calvary to bolster us in our morale and efforts. 

As we sawed, carried, cut, shoveled, and sledded debris from the property to the front, the rain clouds gathered in the northeast. Jared asked Cora if we were going to have a storm, she said, “No, it rains every afternoon about this time.”  

The small army from the other stake had helped us clear the backyard and salvage what tangibles were still good. We gathered with Cora and her family as Bryce led us in a prayer of hope and farewell. We knew the roof still needed more tarping and we promised to return the next day when it was dry to finish.  

Back at the “Youth Legacy Duplessis Park” campsite, I remembered I had left the fly of the tent off for ventilation only to find the afternoon rain left several puddles inside. Jared and Bryce were not too hard on me for my oversight as the evening gave way to FEMA showers and jambalaya.

We met up with Brother Harper and his team from the Hurst 1^st Ward and swapped our “war tales” of the day.  Brother Harper’s team worked on a pre-school attached to an old African American church that was literally moved from its original location back in the late ’60s to the land it sat on now.  

Little did we know as we sat around the campsite that we would be working with two brothers who pulled up in a 2-ton bucket truck inches away from my van. I thought the space might be tight, but it fit just perfectly. The only problem was the wet ground gave way when he tried to back out and the mud swallowed half of his back wheels. After multiple tries to unstick the big truck, it was decided he would call AAA since this was not his first boggy sink.

The next morning the diesel smoke of the AAA tow truck filled the air as the wench line tightened and the big truck groaned under the strain of the pull. Our newfound bucket truck partners and an old acquaintance from our Stake from years gone by, Brother Law, were now free to team up with us for our next assignment. We promised to help them with their work orders if they would help us tarp Cora’s roof.  

When we arrived at the bucket truck job the same familiar scene was all around us. Massive trees down everywhere with acres of patched roofs and blue tarps as far as the eye could see. We took out the large branches from the parallel trees traversed multiple properties. Brother Law said, “Watch out! It looks like a lot of poison ivy and oak vines all around.”  

We sawed and removed until the size of the trunks surpassed the length of our chainsaw blades. A sizable log pinched the chain of my saw to a halt. Jared chided me as he snickered, “What are you going to do now?” I could not let go of the saw as the weight might break the chain. Jared soon returned with another chainsaw and I was able to cut mine free.  

The morning was over and the familiar rainstorm clouds began gathering in the northeast once again. The bucket driver hollered out, “We should get going and tarp that roof before it’s too slick to walk on it.” We all agreed, and our bucket truck battalion headed for Cora’s house.

Upon arrival, our team moved quickly into position. Jared loaded the roof with tarps and board strips. Bryce handed me my nail bag on the roof, but my hammer was nowhere to be found. Jared shook his head in disbelief but not to worry as Ben and Jo Ellen loaned me theirs. Brother Law showed us the safest way to nail down the strips through the tarp at the edge of the roof, with the tarp hanging upside down to the ground. That way we could stand with good traction on the shingles and pull the tarp over, right side up to the next level. As lighting began to dance around us Brother Law said, “We need to get off of here now!” Jared and I scrambled to nail down one more tarp in the corner where he thought he had seen the leak inside. At this point, we could only pray we got the right spot covered.

As we stepped off the last rung of the ladder the rain began to pour. We did not have time to say goodbye to Cora as all took shelter. Cora and her family were safe inside the house as we waved goodbye and headed back to the command center to return the tools.

The sun was shining again, and we unloaded the equipment we had borrowed. Bryce was having a long conversation with the sister missionaries, telling them of his call to soon serve in Montana.  We all smiled as we pulled Bryce into the van to start our 7.5-hour drive back to Fort Worth.  

The week following, I discovered both my arms had a serious poison oak rash. I got it to subside but not before being reminded of the Lord’s gift to Adam and Eve after leaving the Garden of Eden— that by the sweat of their brow they would eat and they would be tormented by thorns thistles and noxious weeds, as they gave us the opportunity grow and serve one another here in mortality. Because of the Lord Jesus Christ, I have learned that being in service to our brothers and sisters, He will redeem us from the fall and bless us in all our efforts.

Barry Dick is a Hurst Texas Stake High Council Advisor of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and resides in the River Trails 1st Ward.