Armies of Texas volunteers dig out, clean up, after fatal floods

Comfort, Texas – It started with a foreigner asking “Do you need help?”

“Yes,” said Paul Welch to man in a van, “I desperately need help.”

A day later, dozens of people stopped outside the modest cabin where Welch and his partner lived overlooking the Guadalupe river to floods from Texas on July 4.

The devastated property looked like a construction site on Saturday after the operators began to clean the debris with mini-excavators and slippage tickets. An army unit of Fort Hood scratched the mud of the cabin while other people tears the dry partitions. A biblical study group of tools washed in San Antonio from Welch’s Barn. His niece carefully wiped the ancient negatives, hoping to preserve some of the couple’s memories.

The Texans lead to the recovery of the floods while more floods touch and the search for the missing continues. Mass cleaning in the county of Kerr – about 1.5 hours northwest of San Antonio – came on Saturday before heavy rains allow the region again on Sunday.

For Welch and Elizabeth Hastings, the July 4 floods sent water to their ceiling, destroyed their VR and ruined most of the articles in their barn.

“Until yesterday, it was quite dark,” he said.

Then Welch said that the man in the truck – Huntly Dantzler by Fredericksburg, 20 miles away – “he showed up.”

“I thought it was too good to be true,” said Welch. “We have hope now.”

In many places, volunteer workforce includes withdrawal of debris and sanitation often carried out by hired entrepreneurs and out of reach for households without insurance. Many survivors said it was simply too expensive.

“It is impossible here in the flood plain,” said Welch. “Paying $ 10,000 a year for flood insurance does not make sense.”

The survivors who spoke with the Associated Press said they had no insurance but had already asked for help from the Federal Emergency Management Agency. This money is rarely sufficient to cover all the costs of replacement, appeal and reconstruction and only 116 FEMA requests were approved on Sunday.

Many of those who work together did not know each other before the disaster – they connected on social networks, in public spaces or simply by leading in search of places to help.

“There are thousands of volunteers here, more than necessary, honestly. It’s wild, and everyone just helps a helping hand,” said Dave Isaacs, who came from San Antonio with his wife and daughter to help.

Three people arrived at Daniel Olivas’ home in Guadalupe Street in Kerrville last week with a buffoon of slippage and an excavator to erase debris. The Guadalupe river water exceeded its house on July 4, leaving fish and crawdads floating in the rooms.

Shortly after, “33 angels went down” on the property, said Olivas, removing furniture, rubbing the floors and tearing the dry partitions.

“It’s just incredible because I didn’t ask for it,” said Olivas. “They just appeared.” Some even insisted to leave it in cash, stuffing it in his pocket when he resisted.

Aid also comes from companies. The World Camping Camping World donated a used motorhome so that Welch and Hastings can sleep as long as they need it. A plumbing company has installed a new water treatment system for its neighbor free of charge.

“We all have a broken heart, and everyone has just participated,” said Monica Watson, an Hopsice worker helping the neighbor of Olivas, an older man who depended on a wheelchair. “He was just waiting for help,” she said.

She said that she had no connection with her collaborators other than a shared desire to contribute.

“A guy just said” I’m well, I have a red lynx (tractor) “, and that was”, “she said.

A woman led by asking if she needed another trailer to transport the garbage and returned with a minute later.

Volunteering can help people face trauma, said Dr. Adrienne Heinz, clinical research psychologist at Stanford University and post-traumatic stress expert.

“When something terrible happens, a powerful human response can happen called” purposes “,” said Heinz. “It is at this point that we are raising to meet moments of sorrow and adversity with a significant and aligned action on values.”

Purpose “offers a stamp against despair and despair and can prepare the ground for post-traumatic growth and transformational resilience,” said Heinz.

For those who are affected, seeing care of the world is also of healing.

“I cannot express how much I appreciate everything they have done for us,” said Colleen Lucas of Ingram, while the staff of the International Charité Blessing helped her husband, Dave, to repair one of their cars that had been overwhelmed in the water.

The staff members of Mexico, Honduras and Chile, as well as 42 members of the Oak Hills church in San Antonio, released Lucas affairs and packed and stored their recoverable objects. She does not know if her house should be demolished, nor how and when they rebuild.

But she is already thinking about how to pay the help they have obtained.

“We have lost a lot, but we are going to make a donation when we stand up,” she said.

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