MPHS: Hurricane Katrina, 2005, by Patrick Hollingsworth

From MemoryArchive

Who: Patrick Hollingsworth
What: Hurricane Katrina
When: 2005
Where: Moss Point, MS

Hurricane Katrina affected me severely. We had 2 to 3 feet of water in our house. We went without power for at least 3 weeks. Everyday, we depended on lines for ice and Red Cross meals since all of our food either spoiled or got wet and was no good.

My grandpa walked outside to the shed just in time to see the water coming in. He said that there was one wave about a foot tall followed by another wave about three feet tall coming through the woods to our house. As the water rose, my mom called asking what she should do. She lived in Pascagoula and had ankle deep water in her house already. She wanted to come to our house, but my grandma told her that she better stay at her house because it would be too dangerous to drive across the brigde.

Once the water went down, mud was everywhere, and everything was soaking wet or turned upside down. We didn't have a generator because the one that we had started shooting oil and couldn't run our deep freezer and our refridgerator. Everything that could be easily moved had floated out of the door. Shoes went out one side of the door and trash came in the other side.

On Tuesday, the day after the hurricane, we got our truck running, and drove to Pascagoula to check on my mom. There was trees and trash everywhere, and when we got to her house, a roof off of a house down the road had ripped perfectly off of the house it was on and landed neatly in the middle of the road. We picked my mom and my brother up and went back to our house, where we began to try and clean things up.

It has been over two years now since the hurricane hit, and we have finally finished rebuilding. We got our cabinets in about a month ago, and my grandpa has finished putting in final touches. i know that the hurricane will be something that I will never forget. I also know that it will be something for people to learn from for years to come.