The Woodlands (United States) (AFP) – Nine-year-old Luna is hard at play inside a church shelter north of Houston, but it’s been an emotional rollercoaster for the Rosales family since a rescue crew guided them to safety through the cold floodwaters engulfing their home.
For Arnulfo Rosales, 66, his children and grandchildren, help came at the end of an anxious five-hour wait as Harvey’s torrential rains lashed their hometown of New Caney, a town of 20,000 northeast of Houston.
Arnulfo’s son Juan saw the water rising around their house when he woke up at 7 am Monday.
“By noon, the water was starting to get into the house, and that’s when we decided to leave. It was five when the boats came for us,” Juan, a 31-year-old father of two, recounted from the safety of the church-turned-shelter in Woodlands, a small city north of Houston.
They owe their escape to civilian volunteers and a sheriff from the neighboring state of Louisiana.
“We didn’t really know if we were going to get out of there or not. We were there five hours, as they were coming and going,” said Juan, whose wife Lorena explained that rescuers gave priority to people with medical conditions.
To board one of the boats manned by volunteer rescuers, the family of Mexican descent first had to wade more than a mile (1.5 kilometers) through cold water to a pick-up point.
But they also got a taste of the solidarity on display since Harvey made landfall in the southern US state nearly a week ago.
“Neighbors who had a canoe took the children with them so that they wouldn’t get wet,” Lorena said.
By that point her seven-year-old son was shaking with the cold.
“We could not keep him warm anymore and when I put him on my shoulders, the rescuers saw us and waited for us and we were able to get on the boat.”
Juan and Arnulfo had to wait for another ride for lack of space.
“The water started rising faster and my dad and I had to get through it, the water was very strong and reached up to my chest,” Juan recalled.
– Show of solidarity –
A bus ride later, the Rosales family reached an emergency shelter in New Caney. It was full, but they got a clean change of clothes and a place to sleep on the floor.
It was only once they reached Woodlands Church that they could finally breathe easy.
When pastors of this large evangelical church decided to convert their community center into a shelter, the donations quickly poured in, and within just six hours, it was supplied with diapers, blankets, groceries, toys, clothes and even dozens of crates for pets.
“It’s been amazing just to see the response from our congregation, and the community,” said a church pastor, 28-year-old Matt van Houten.
“There are about 50 evacuees currently. We’re never completely prepared for a storm like this, but our goal as a church is to try to help however we can help,” he added as he toured the site, greeting dozens of volunteers and lending a hand.
The Rosales family has been there for barely an hour as a smiling Luna emerges in her socks from the shelter’s playroom — where she was clambering over colored obstacles with the kids of some of the volunteers — to join her parents and grandfather seated nearby.
What has happened to their home? They prefer not to give it too much thought for the time being.
“We can’t do anything right now. So the best thing is to wait. The house is flooded, it is already lost. We can start over,” Arnulfo said.
Added Juan: “So what if we lose our things, so long as we are well. We can always but new stuff. But if I lose my dad, my wife or my children, I am never getting them back.”