Fran Daniels

Today's day was so big I may have to break it into multiple posts. Hopefully I'll have time to post everything...

First - Fran Daniels
Fran, second from the left, is the owner of the home that my team is helping to rebuild. Fran, her sister, two of her brothers, and her father all lost their homes in Katrina. She told us the story of how her father, brother, and nephew survived the storm at her father's home which is about a mile from the coast.

When the news announced that Katrina would be a category 5 storm, Fran and most of her family decided to leave the area. Because Fran's father has seen many hurricanes and has survived the flooding before, her father, brother, and nephew decided to try to survive the storm by bailing water out the windows. When the water level reached the ceiling, they moved to the attic. When the water level continued to rise, they chopped a hole in the roof with an axe, and climbed out onto it. The men tied each other together with ropes, and attached the rope to a tree to keep from being swept away.

The 3 men survived the 10 hour storm and 34 feet of flooding for two reasons only.
#1 - The storm occurred during the daytime. If it had happened at night, they would have had no electricity or any other means to see and secure themselves on the roof. According to the men they surely would have died if Katrina had come at night.
#2 - The men survived 34 feet of flooding on a roof that was no more than 15 feet high. If the house had stayed in tact, Fran's family would have been swept away. Luckily the house was torn from the foundation and they were able to survive by clinging to the roof as the entire house floated away.

Fran told us that after the storm, North St., through which I drove into town, was littered with entire houses. Many people who lived here in Pass Christian don't even know what happened to their houses. When they returned, they had nothing but a vacant lot.

I wrote in a previous post that it felt like we're out in the country here. This place used to be a beach town. It only looks like the country because almost all the homes were carried away, and after 2 years foliage has grown over where all the houses used to be. Here's a shot of overgrown beach front property:
Today was unbelievable. I'm still having trouble grasping how much these people's lives have been shaken.