Hurricane Andrew The Aftermath (Long and Detailed) *PC*

First and foremost.... I found a video on YouTube of actual news footage from Andrew... Its long, but watching it made me start to shake... the sounds, the pictures.... 15 years since that storm, and it still hurts... so bad.

It just took me a few minutes to calm myself so that I could write this... Im reliving hell. Ok.... I can do this....



After my family and I (and all 5 dogs, in case anyone wondered) climbed from our house out into the street, we no longer recognized our city. There was a tree in my front yard that had been there throughout Hurricane Hugo, Hurricane Camille, as well as many other storms... it didn't survive Andrew. The tree fell, taking it with it the sidewalk, the road, and half our front lawn. We looked at our neighbors and saw the same dazed look on their faces. So, we turned, climbed back into the house, salvaged what clothes and food we could, and started to make our way to the Leisure City Moose Lodge.

Now, a Moose Lodge is a lot like the Elks, or any other club of that nature. My mother worked there as a bartender and was a member, my grandmother and grandfather also were members. So thats where we headed. But please note, everyone was welcome there. No one was turned away unless they were criminal. To this day, I don't remember how we got there. I do remember some of the things I saw however.

Warning: Graphic Nature Follows. May not be suitable for all.

Don't say I didn't warn you... I remember seeing a 2x4 impaled through a palm tree. I remember seeing a horse impaled on a light pole. I saw more dead animals then anything. At least those are what stick in my mind. The horse... you could hear it hooves hitting the metal. Thats why we noticed it. I wish we hadn't.



We made it to the Moose Lodge, and settled in. I think there was about 40 of us there. They had two generators, so we had power to cook, but that was it. The meals were small... the tempers ran high. People had just had their entire lives destroyed in the course of a night... Unless you were there, I can't explain the feeling...

As said before, I was 8 years old. At 8, my grandfather taught me how to fire a handgun. This was because of the looters that were stripping the city clean after the storm. I was taught to fire at a point a foot away from their foot the first shot... and if the person kept coming, I was taught to fire at their belly, which was the largest target. I only fired that gun at one person, and luckily, he was a friend, not a foe. To explain that, one night I was outside with my grandfather on patrol. It was my families night, and I had wanted to be by my grandpa, so there I was, sitting in the grass, a handgun fully loaded with the safety off laying in the grass beside me. It was dark, remember, there is no power, and I saw someone walking toward the back door. My grandfather had gone inside for a few moments to 'relive' himself. This man started toward me, I picked up the gun, aimed, asked who he was. He didn't answer, I warned him that I had a gun and would fire if he did not identify himself, he still didn't answer (later he said that he assumed a little kid like me was holding a water gun) so I held true to my word. I fired the gun, aiming at a point about a foot from him. That gun knocked me back in the grass, but he stopped walking. My family came running to see what had happened, and years later, that old man still thought it was funny as hell that an 8 yr old fired a gun at him for the first time in his life.

Remember people... it was martial law here. It took the US National Guard a little over a week to reach Homestead, and a few more days to reach us. It was litterly a kill or be killed enviroment. This was not a joke, it was not a game. At 8 years old, I learned to be an adult. I lost my entire childhood to one night. And I never got it back.

We survived in that lodge for what seemed like forever, but was actually more like 2 weeks. Laundry was done in huge barrels, with paddles, and hung to dry. All meals were cold except for dinner, when the second generator was turned on to power the stove. We took showers fully clothed, under a ladder with a curtain around it, using a garden hose. You always wanted to be the first shower of the day, so the water would be warm. Otherwise, it was ice cold.

The younger children got to play... the older children (and me, being the granddaughter of a Marine and the daughter of a Navy) had patrol, or chores, or something.

We slept on banquet tables with one blanket, one pillow. Some were on the floor, some were on the stage. (The Lodge had a HUGE ballroom) You fell asleep to the sounds of people crying, sirens in the far distance, but every night, they got a little bit closer. And every night, I prayed it wouldn't come back.

On to an amusing story... My family had a row of tables we slept on. The row went Grandma, Grandpa, Me, Mom. Some of you may yet again be wondering where our dogs were. They were in a section of the bar, that became known as the dog house. Someone found chicken wire, and sectioned off different parts of the bar for everyones animals to live. So no mistreatment here folks! Anyway, one night, we are all sounds asleep when this thunderous crash resounds through the ballroom. I sit up screaming, thinking its Andrew back to kill me, and then I notice that my grandfathers table looks weird. Picture this if you will. On the top half of my grandpas table, the legs had collapsed, sending my grandfathers head into the floor. Now, he had slid onto the floor, and even after the crash that woke up pretty much EVERYONE in the place... my grandfather was sound asleep. Snoring away in a diagonal position. We left him there till the morning. He said he thought it was thunder and had gone back to sleep.

Back to the hard part.... After the week and a half that I mentioned, the National Guard finally made their way to Leisure City. Oh, by the way, Leisure city is next to Homestead. We finally got some much needed supplies, and since we had the lodge for the time being, they werent to worried about finding us housing. They gave us sleeping bags, pillows, and a few others things, and they let us use phones so that we could finally call our families outside of Florida to tell them we surivived. My grandfather called my Uncle Jimi who lived in North Carolina, and told him (with my mothers consent, but not mine) to come get me and my grandmother, and take us back to NC, with the dogs, until my mom and grandpa came to get us. A week later, my uncle arrived, and admist my screams, my grandmother and I were headed for New Bern.

If you read my Favorite Christmas Memory post... you will see how I felt about New Bern, NC.

For years after... I had horrible nightmares about Hurricane Andrew. Any time a thunderstorm would come around, I would swear that it was him, coming to kill me. It was always the same nightmare.... me reliving that night in my head, over and over again. I still have those nightmares on occasion. 15 years later... I still think that storm wants to kill me.

And thats my story. Now you all have some insight into my inner workings.

Here are some random pictures of the aftermath of Andrew...

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