Printer FriendlyJust Read, Florida!
Just Read, Florida! |
| Text Index |
Custom Search
|
HWAW Essay Contest Winners
It's only been a few months since the last “big one” hit--a force of nature that wrought destruction on people, animals, buildings, and the environment. The weather station announced that the “motherload” of all hurricanes was approaching, but this time with more of her “friends.” We would soon be blasted by 148 mph winds that would increase over time, making this hurricane a category five on impact. Floods and tornadoes with fierce strength would make this hurricane the most devastating yet. My family and I, along with our neighbors, helped each other prepare. This time we would be ready! My dad and several neighbors secured our homes, reinforcing the roofs, shutters, doors, and garage doors to withstand hurricane and tornado power. They trimmed off loose branches and trees that could fall on homes and power lines, and boarded up all windows and doors with plywood for protection from strong winds. They removed all lawn ornaments, including Mrs. Norris’s “lovely” garden gnomes. My mom and her friends gathered several five-gallon water bottles and water packs, and many non-perishable foods that could feed an army twice over. She filled the gas tank to our car and bought supplies like batteries, first-aid kits, medicine, clothes, and blankets which made our home seem like a mini-hospital. My mom gathered all the important documents and valuables in water proof containers, protecting them from water damage. She called family members and friends in other states, warning them beforehand that my family might need to spend a few days with them later due to the hurricane. My friends and I took care of our pets, checking to see if their vaccinations were up to date and making them collars with their identification information. We bought supplies and food to make them feel calm when the hurricane hit. Also, I made a check list of the supplies and actions involved in preparing for the “motherload” to help my parents feel more organized. Destruction day! All of us followed our plan. My family and dog huddled in my parent’s walk-in closet, away from the windows. We listened to the radio for information. Heavy rains and fierce winds tore through the state. A few days later, a strange quiet replaced the hurricane's wrath. We all stepped outside to see that our neighborhood was damaged but amazingly intact. It was over. Our neighborhood fought back--finally seeing that only preparation could prevent separation from everything that we most loved.
August 28, 1992: I coughed as I pulled myself from under some rubble. Rubbing the dust out of my eyes, I hacked a couple of coughs, taking in the devastation around me. “Holy…” The house was completely devastated. Walls were blown in, windows shattered, and debris coated the floor. My parents stood stunned, looking at what was once their beloved home. Hurricane Andrew had gotten us good. My brother came over to me and helped me stand. I brushed some dirt off my torn jeans and walked over to my parents. They led my brother and me outside. Looking both ways down the road, which was under a layer of muddy water, our neighbor’s houses was just as ruined, if not even more. My mom slogged off to check on them while my dad ran to get our chain saw. A second look over at our house showed that it was actually not all that damaged. Some of the windows were cracked, but had held because we had covered them. We had moved all our outdoor furniture into the garage and compared to the neighbors, we were pretty well-off. The barricades on the doors had come loose, but it was obvious that they had prevented a lot of potential damage. Our rain gutters barely hung from the roof, but it was thanks to them that our house wasn’t flooded. The tree branches that were scattered across the yard were pretty minor - my dad had trimmed our oak when hurricane season started. My mom slogged back to my brother and me, checking if we were ok. She shook her head, “I’m so glad I checked our insurance. We’ll get covered for most of this. The poor Smiths three doors down just realized that theirs expired a few months ago.” “Go see if our supplies are ok!” my dad yelled, trying to fire the chain saw up. I went back into the house, cautiously watching the frame, waiting for the soaked wooden beams to fall at any time. Digging around the ravaged pantry, I recovered our Red Cross emergency kit. My brother helped me bring the supplies out as he returned from finding our battery-powered radio. In addition to the first aid, flashlights, water purification tablets, batteries, and several other items of importance, we had stocked it with bottled water and canned food. Thank goodness we had planned ahead; the broadcast on the radio told us that help wouldn’t be able to arrive for several days. Warnings about not drinking the contaminated rain water streamed across the airways. Stories of miraculous survivals gave us hope. We were going to be ok.
It has been a month since the cataclysm took place. Electricity is back on in the city and the anarchy of scared citizens has settled. As I sit here and think back to all the people who died and all the damage that was done in the catastrophe, I realize how much I appreciate my mom teaching my family the survival tactics that we viewed as useless antics. My mom had always tried to prepare us for natural disasters or sudden negative changes in the world. She taught us the skills we would need to survive on our own if it were to ever come to it. She taught us to budget and save our money. Twenty percent of everything we would make, she would have us put in our individual piggy banks. She would also have us save the change after every purchase we would make. She taught us how to cook on a grill and how to work together. We would laugh when she would go to the grocery store to buy food and would buy extra canned goods and boxed foods that she would put in our closets and under our beds. She taught us how to portion out our food to last long too. My mom had a large supply of candles and batteries in our trunk along with two days worth of clothing for each of us. She even had outfits for us at our grandmother’s house just in case. This all seemed so over the top until her tactics came to use after the disaster. When the electricity went out, cooking on the grill became the main way of preparing food since the oven was out. We had to rely on the canned goods and boxed foods we had stored around the house because frozen meat we had in the freezer lasted only a few days with the refrigerator not running. There was so much stored food that we shared with our neighbors and still have more left over. With all the money we had saved in our banks, we had enough money to get a hotel room when the strong winds blew a tree over on the roof. The clothes we had in the trunk and at my grandmother’s house were what we had to wear because our clothes at our house got ruined with water damage from the hole in the roof. We used the rest of our money to buy a generator to have our roof fixed after the rain stopped and used our candles and flashlights to light our house once we moved back into it. If it wasn’t for the survival plan my mom had constructed just in case anything were to happen, we would not have been as lucky as we were during the catastrophe. Other people we knew lost everything and some even lost their lives. But her survival plan saved us all.
“Have you seen the hurricane’s projected path?” I exclaimed last Tuesday morning in class. “The eye of the storm is expected to come right through Crestview. Isabella and Sarah, you guys are so lucky you get to leave for your uncle’s house. My family has to stay here since my Dad is a firefighter. I have so much to do to prepare for this raging storm which meteorologists claim is just 3 days away! Wish me luck.” When I first saw the hurricane’s projected path, I was terrified. Especially since Mom said we had to stay put. Immediately I sprang into action. The first thing I set out to accomplish was gathering safety guidelines online. The task was very simple and most helpful. I told Dad we needed to gather our plywood and nail it over all the windows to prevent glass breaking if loose articles outside during the storm should hit one. Then I had both my parents gather the important documents, such as birth certificates, insurance paperwork, and pictures of the inside and outside of our home and place them in a waterproof box, locked tight. Next we went to Wal-Mart and bought bagfuls of non-perishable food items, purified bottled water, extra matches, a weather radio, a flashlight with extra batteries, and a plentiful first aid kit. We also bought a few books, markers, and coloring sheets, to keep my younger brothers entertained. Upon returning home I made sure both the flashlight and the weather radio worked since we would be extremely dependent on each. Then I packed away the water bottles, food, can opener, radio, flashlight, first aid kit, matches, candles and books in a large waterproof bag, hoping the fact it was waterproof wouldn’t be needed. Then I gathered pillows and blankets in hopes to keep everyone comfortable throughout the storm. I placed this all in my parents’ closet, and then I sterilized the bathtub. This is so I could fill it with water before the storm hit in order to provide us with an ample supply of clean water. By now the storm was due to hit in the early hours of the next morning. We were prepared, but I was still nervous! My family and I slept in the closet that night. We remained in the closet all day, only leaving to use the bathroom 5 feet away. The hurricane was vicious: the wind howled nonstop and the rain slammed down hard on our rooftop. When it was safe to leave, according to the reporters on the weather radio, my neighborhood was unrecognizable. Trees had fallen, windows had broken, shutters had been violently ripped away and cars were overturned. The city was a disaster area! It was apparent that it would be days without electricity and movement in the city. I was relieved that I had researched and followed through on a safety plan that kept my family safe and fed in the days following the disaster.
Story of Survival You’ve heard of hurricanes and tornadoes destroying whole towns. I’m sure you’ve heard of mud slides and floods causing devastation and disaster. These have two things in common. One, they destroy everything in their path; and two, they are considered natural disasters because man has no control over them. My family was once involved in a natural disaster that changed our lives. When you hear warnings or watches on TV or radio for hurricanes, you don’t truly pay that much attention to them except for a passing thought. I used to be the same way and only gave them a passing thought, but since Hurricane Parker, I jump at the very mention of a hurricane, whether it’s close to us or farther away. I watch every report on TV and listen to every radio report just in case. Hurricane season has become the most terrifying season for me since Hurricane Parker hit our neighborhood. It started in the month of September. It had been hurricane season for a while, and there hadn’t been any strong hurricanes. The weather forecasters had been discussing Hurricane Parker for days. No one ever thought it would ever hit land because it was so weak, but Hurricane Parker decided to prove that it had power. One September night Parker, a category four hurricane, hit quickly destroying everything in its path: cars, houses, and stores. About 4 a.m. we heard it coming down the street. My father burst into my room carrying my young brother in his arms and yelling at me to hurry to the basement. We ran down the stairs where my mother, sister, and two dogs were waiting. We all sat huddled together in the basement and listened to the wind and rain tearing the house above us apart. We could hear glass and wood breaking and being carried off. The minutes ticking by felt like hours as we sat waiting for Hurricane Parker to pass. My family and I slowly made our way from the basement to the surface, only to see destruction of everything. I recall, now, seeing families emerging from their basements and bursting into tears at the sight of destruction. Our family with others separated to look for anyone who had been hurt during the storm. Out of the seventeen families in our neighborhood, someone in only two had minor injuries, mostly cuts, bruises, and one man had a broken arm. Thankfully, no one had been killed during this unfortunate event. But, there was sadness over the loss and damage of property. A year later people had pulled their lives together. After the storm our community united to clean up the neighborhood and help each other out. We managed to get our neighborhood clean of trash and start the rebuilding of our homes. I believe that we saved ourselves some pain by having a plan, even if it was a small one. This just goes to show you that even a small plan can save lives.
I turned the TV on to the local news so I could check the weather. “SEVERE WEATHER ALERT!” the anchor practically screamed into the microphone as she waved her hands wildly about her frazzled, windswept hair. I checked the NOAA Hurricane tracking site, as my father and I have always done in past severe weather alerts. Hurricane Hester was rapidly approaching southwest Florida; what we once thought was going to be a category one storm had rapidly morphed into a category five. The bridge was closed without delay; we had no access to the mainland. I immediately enacted the plan my parents and I had created at the beginning of the hurricane season. I darted to the kitchen, grabbed canned goods, bottles of water, and enough flashlights and batteries for at least a week from the carton designated “emergency” at the bottom of the pantry. I snatched the travel bag that my parents had lovingly assembled for our large standard poodle and crammed in a few extra treats. The designated closet in the main interior hallway on the second floor was our shelter, since it had no windows. I laid down six comfy blankets, several pillows and jammed the supplies inside. There wasn’t sufficient time to secure our house, but I locked every window in our house and moved the potted plants on the porch inside the garage. I also backed up the family’s car against the garage door, hoping that the tension would secure it. I took down my parents’ favorite paintings, covered them in the plastic I found in a storage-shed, and placed them gently in the closet adjacent to my shelter. I took valuables and secured them in the safe in another room. Glancing quickly outside, I watched the wind whipping the palm trees almost sideways. I stood watching, mesmerized by the sheer force of the wind, but as one palm tree came crashing onto the deck, I snapped out of it, called my dog, and rushed to our shelter. Three hours later the crashing, thrashing and menacing wind subsided. I opened the closet/shelter, and stepped into what could have been my living room, if the front yard hadn’t taken over the entire house. Just then I heard a loud, piercing horn. The Red Cross asked if I needed any assistance, but I told them I was fine. Mindful of others who might not have been so fortunate, I checked on my neighbors and helped them pick up the debris the storm had ravaged upon us. Having an emergency plan ready in case of a natural disaster certainly kept us safe in a perilous situation. The travel bag and surplus of batteries, water bottles and canned goods made it much easier for me to focus on securing our house and belongings and worry less on how I was going to survive the impending storm. We were lucky to only sustain property damage and no physical injuries. I believe that this is due to our proper emergency plan execution.
Like most people, I have a daily routine that starts every morning when I wake up, and this day was no different. As usual, I brushed every tooth in my mouth with my electric toothbrush and cinnamon-flavored toothpaste; as usual, I showered and washed my hair with a fruity-scented shampoo while singing the Beach Boys’ “Do You Wanna Dance?”; as usual, I put on my comfy white robe and sat down at the living room table with two perfectly golden brown pieces of toast and a glass of 2% low fat milk; as usual, the milk in my glass started to shake while a low rumbling noise sounded in the backgr — wait. That’s unusual. What was that noise? The rumbling sounded as if it were coming closer, and as it did, everything on the table began to tremble, along with the pictures on the walls. “Earthquake! Mom! Dad! Delaney! EARTHQUAKE!” I shouted, already ducking under the table. My sister Delaney was the first to respond to my warning, jumping up from the couch and running straight to the table just as our family had planned in case we ever faced this situation. As my sister joined me under the table, my parents rushed into the room from different parts of the house. We huddled as a family beneath the living room table, a sight that would seem very strange on any other day. The earthquake came like a stampede of elephants, growing so loud that we couldn’t hear each other scream as we witnessed the demolition of our home. I watched my glass of milk fall to the ground, shattering into a hundred sharp pieces, one of which cut my father’s forearm; I watched the lights flicker and the pipes of our kitchen sink break apart, shooting water out in every direction; I watched a wall collapse completely, falling on top of the couch where my sister had sat just minutes before. The table sheltered us from a chandelier, which crashed directly over our heads. Tears streamed down my face as I prayed it would all end. Finally, the earthquake moved past us, taking the violence away with it. Everything settled to a frightening silence and stillness, and we sat with eyes wide open and brains at work to accept what had just happened. I went to see my room, or at least what was my room. Nothing was right—the ceiling was on the floor, and the floor hung on the walls. Outside I could see the neighbors’ houses leaning against each other as if they were too weak to stand on their own. My family and I came back together and held each other, understanding that if it weren’t for our preparation we might never have been able to hold each other again. That wall could have crushed Delaney, or the chandelier could have come down on our heads. Anything could have happened. But we survived. Together, we were able to live through that unusual day. |