The Happy Ending - continuation of the flood story

In my last post, I told you all about the flood Pato and I got to be a part of.  I left off where we had gotten evacuated to an elementary school. 

We had been aimlessly wandering around the cafeteria for a little bit when the janitor came.  He said he would be opening up the gym  and getting out basketballs (several men in the room cheered) and also that he had opened the library and turned on the TV in the library with news from the area – something we were all hungry for.  He also introduced a lady from the community who said they would do whatever they could for us.  Pato and I went into the library for a few minutes.  I was just checking out what young adult fiction I would want to read to pass the time when they announced over the PA system for everyone to come back to the cafeteria.  We went back and they announced that the Red Cross would not be able to set up at that school and so we would be moved.  They would move us by school bus to a sports arena on the campus of the university in Binghamton.  Around this time some of the friends we had made were starting to leave.  There were two couples on vacation to the Finger Lakes area who were being picked up by one of their daughters who lived in the area.  Also I had gotten to know a lady who worked at the Wendy’s across from the hotel and around this time a friend or relative came to get her. 

As I was walking around saying goodbye to people I knew, a lady walked by who I thought must be from the community.  The community people had meanwhile brought in PB sandwiches and snacks that they were handing out.  I stopped her briefly to say “Thank you so much for coming and helping us!”  Pato was there too while I was talking to her.  She asked where we were from and I briefly told her our story.  Then she said “Would you like to come stay at our house?  We live nearby.”  Pato and I were struck dumb.  My first thought was “Wow, what a kind offer, but why us?”  She noticed both of us didn’t know what to say and repeated the offer, saying her sons had just moved out to go to college and that they had room.  We still hadn’t got our voices back and she said “Oh, I can let the two of you think about it.”  Pato and I looked at each other.  There was no question as to whether this was a wonderful, amazing offer.  We said, no, we don’t need time to think about it, we just were so caught off guard by your generosity that at first we didn’t know what to say.  A few minutes later the announcement was made that the busses had arrived.  I think she could see that we might get pressured into getting on the busses, so she talked to her husband who was there and he said he would walk us to their house.  It was cloudy and damp, but wasn’t raining.  We walked through the school yard and about half a block through a nice neighborhood and were at their house.  I think Pato and I were a little dazed and didn’t even really realize it for awhile.  Kevin – that was the husband’s name- said when he had arrived at the school and looked through the windows of the cafeteria he thought that everyone in the room “looked like their dog had just died.” 

Kim stayed at the school to help out for awhile since right before we left they found out another group of evacuees was going to be brought there before being taken to BU sports arena.  Kim was a teacher at the school, so she thought she ought to stay and help. 

We talked with Kevin out on their patio when we got to their home.  Since it wasn’t raining it was nice to be outside.  It was also the only place we could get any cell phone coverage.  The coverage was intermittent, but we started being able to  make some calls and sending some emails. 

It was funny, we felt like we were holding up well through everything:  just kind of watching the flooding and just going along with the experience.  After a few hours at their house though a sense of normalcy started to return and we realized that we really had felt somewhat displaced.  But the overarching feeling was one of wonder and gratitude that we had been taken home by these lovely people and that we had been so protected and taken care of throughout the day.  When I thought of all the people who had just lost their homes, or large amounts of property, or who had been without power completely we were just amazed that we had passed through all of this with so little problem or hardship and now these kind people had given us a place to stay.  

I was due to fly out the next day, Friday, so the most important thing we found out as we talked to Kevin was that the Binghamton airport wasn’t far from there and that there would be a way to drive there without going through flooded areas.  I started to say “I could get a taxi” but then realized that would probably not be possible and anyway, they said they would be happy to take me. 

Pato’s plan was to have stayed at least until Monday since the equipment from work was supposed to arrive sometime, but in talking to Kim we realized that it would be a few days until things got back to any kind of normal operations in the area.  We found that there was room on my flight, and so Friday afternoon, after spending a delightful 24 hours with Kim and Kevin, we were both on our way to the airport.  Kim and Kevin didn’t mind the chance to go for a drive and also wanted to drive out a little further to see if they could find a grocery store that still had some groceries. 

At the airport Kim stayed until we made sure our flight was going to leave (most of the flights Wed and Thurs had been cancelled). 

We flew out two hours less than exactly a week from when we had flown in. 

The whole week was filled with wonderful and amazing experiences.  The thing Pato and I pondered as we waited at the airport was how much harder it would have been for us to leave and fly home if we had ended up in that stadium.  There were thousands of people there, and by Wednesday or so of the next week, we heard there were still displaced people there.  Pato had a work colleague in the area who offered to come get us, but his area was flooded too and it might have taken some time.  As it was, instead of spending Thursday night in cots with thousands of people in an arena, we stayed in Kim and Kevin’s comfortable basement apartment.  Although staying in the arena would have been an experience too, we were grateful for the chance to get to know these kind, gracious people.

The quote I left in the note for Kim and Kevin expressed our thanks:  “God does notice us, and he watches over us.  But it is usually through another person that he meets our needs.” 

 

A map of Palmyra - more about that in the next blogSo just under two weeks ago Pato found out that he needed to go back to Owego, New York again for work. He had been out there several times this year. He was scheduled to fly out the Tuesday after Labor Day. We didn't have plans for Labor Day weekend, and so I had been thinking it would be fun to plan a trip together. When we found out he would be going back to Owego, we decided to change his flight to the Friday before Labor Day and see if we could find a flight for me. That all worked out. Our plan was to fly into the airport (Binghamton) where Paul would be flying for work anyway, rent a car and then drive to Palmyra and see the church history sites since I had never been to them. (Palmyra is about a two hour drive from Binghamton. Binghamton is in the southern part of upstate New York, near the Pennsylvania border.) After we had the flights booked and a bed and breakfast in Palmyra to stay in, I thought I ought to let T-man and S know we were going to be in their general area, even though we weren't planning on enough time to visit them. I sent them an email. A little later S called me and said that they were already planning on being in Palmyra that weekend, along with K-Rae! What a great surprise! We had a wonderful time in Palmyra, part of the time with them and Letty and Gracie and Baby A and part of the time on our own. My next blog entry will be about that. But this entry is about what happened after we left Palmyra.

On Tuesday afternoon we left the Palmyra area and headed towards Owego, driving along one of the finger Lakes. We had a nice dinner together and then headed to our hotel, the Hampton Inn in Owego New York. We were on the third floor, so when it started to rain during the night we could hear it. It rained hard all day Wednesday - harder and faster than I have ever seen except in the worst thunderstorm. But, it was very nice hotel and in the morning there was a great view from the breakfast room of the Susquehanna river. Paul had stayed there before, but I had forgotten it was right on the Susquehanna. We did some laundry and emails and in the afternoon decided to go to the Corning Glass Museum in Corning, about a half hour drive from Owego. As we drove we turned on the radio. We found out that all the schools in the area had been closed and flooding was expected. They said they thought the flooding would be the same or a little higher than a big historic flood they had had in 2006. They said a storm had stalled in the area and the heavy rain had not been expected, but that, coming right on the heels of Hurricane Irene, the ground was already saturated, thus, the expected flooding. On our way back to Owego from the Corning Museum (which by the way was awesome) it was still raining hard and we started to notice flooded fields and farms as we drove along the 17, parallel to the Susquehanna. We did pause to question whether we should even be going back, but it seemed like the right thing to do so we kept going. Besides, all our things were in the hotel. By the time we were getting back to Owego, a state of emergency for the county had been declared. They said to get what you need and get inside by dark.

We went and got gas and went to the grocery store across the street, then went back to the hotel for the evening. By then the water was creeping from the river up into a field at the west end of the hotel.

That night the power went out about 4 am. It was pitch dark in the room - the power was out throughout the whole village of Owego. A little while later the hotel generator came on with lights illuminating the parking lot below our window. Suddenly we could see that nearly the whole parking lot was flooded, at least somewhat. Our rental car, right below our bedroom window was still on dry ground, but most of the rest of our lot was flooded, along with the neighboring parking lots (there were two other hotels next to us along the river) and the street and the parking lot of the grocery store across the street. Although the water was creeping toward our car, there was nothing to do about it since the way out of the lot was too deep to drive through. But anyway, we weren't too worried because we had seen some photos the night before of where the water had gotten to in 2006, so we thought the water would probably reach its peak soon. For the next hour or so we just sat by our window and watched the water rise as it gradually got light.

Eventually we went downstairs and got some breakfast. They had put out all the cold food, so we had cereal and fruit and yogurt and hard boiled eggs. All the hotel guests were very chatty, so that was kind of fun. We heard from someone then that the water wasn't supposed to crest for quite some time - several hours at least. Everyone sort of wandered around and watched the water rise. The Hampton was built in 2007 and so it was built on struts, elevating it higher than the flood levels had been in 2006. Although the parking lot was flooded and we couldnt leave, we had at least lights in the halls at at the front desk and could see that it would be quite some time before the water would get up to the first floor of the hotel.

Hotel guests sitting under the Hotel entrance portico, watching the water rise.

Pato by the windo in the breakfast room looking over the Susquehanna RiverPika standing in the hotel front portico area. The photo shows where part of their driveway was washed out (weakened from below) earlier this spring.

A couple people in a canoe paddling down what had been the street in front of the hotel. The Arby's in the background was a little higher and the cars there stayed dry until late in the day.

As the water kept rising it eventually started to get into our car. We watched random electrical failures happen on other cars in the lot - windshield wipers coming on, parking lights fading on and off, even a truck popping open. The light blue car in the middle of the photo below is our rental car. It was parked by the ramp leading up the the hotel entrance on the side of the building away from the river.

This photo shows the village of Owego when the flooding was at its height. Some people told us later they had never seen flooding go beyond Front Street, the first street parallelling the river. As you can see, this flooding went through almost the whole village. Here is an aerial shot of our hotel and the neighboring Treadway Hotel. Our car is parked below the red arrow. The front entrance portico of the hotel is at the left end of the hotel in this shot. The water at this point was quite a ways up the first floor of the Treadway hotel, but was just to the first floor of the Hampton Inn we were staying in. The generator for the hotel can be seen at the bottom right hand corner of the hotel. It was starting to be threatened by the rising water.

A view of the end door of the Treadway hotel from the portico/front door of the Hampton Inn.

Eventually the hotel let us know that the National Guard would be coming to get us. We packed up our room and packed small bags to take with us. Some friends we had made who had rooms on the first floor left some of their luggage in our room for safekeeping. We waited a couple hours, still watching out the windows until the trucks arrived. They had big wheels and were able to drive through the deep water.

Below - a view out of our hotel room window of where the trucks parked. You can see part of our car in the lower right hand corner of the picture.

We had to walk through just an inch or so of water to climb into the trucks, twenty people per truck. Below - a shot out the back of the truck as we drive away from the Hampton Inn. Treadway Hotel is to the left of the photo.

We rode through water and uphill in the trucks. They eventually brought us to an elementary school. We had not had cell phone service all day, and we didn't here either, although some others had some reception. We all went to the Cafeteria of the school and hung out. Well, I need to tell you the happy ending of this adventure, but I'm out of time for the moment. Oh, by the way, Thursday the 8th of September, the day we were evacuated, was our wedding anniversary. Quite the memorable one!