AUSTIN (KXAN) — A Texas girl says she and her household, after being swept away by floodwaters early Saturday morning, managed to outlive by climbing a tree.
Melissa Higginbotham lives in Leander, simply down the road from the Travis County Emergency Companies District 1 station and the Spherical Mountain Baptist Church. She defined that, round midnight, she seen there was water in her entrance yard.
“About 2, my dad got here banging on the door, ‘We obtained to go,'” she recounted to Nexstar’s KXAN on Sunday.
Higginbotham and her daughter, plus their household pug, loaded right into a automotive and tried to get to larger floor; but it surely was too late, the water had risen too shortly. They then piled into her dad’s truck in an try to flee.
“My automotive floated off, we nonetheless have not discovered it. After which we watched our neighbors of their double-wide float previous us with their entire household in the home. They happily hit some timber again right here and stopped and made it,” Higginbotham stated.
The truck that Higginbotham and her household had been in started floating as properly.
They hit a tree, crawled out the window of the truck, and climbed up the tree. Higginbotham, her dad and her daughter stayed there for roughly two hours till the water receded some and emergency crews got here.
“God was with us and God made positive we had been okay,” stated Higginbotham.
These residing round her, lots of whom are household, had been serving to to select up the items on Sunday.
“It is Leander at it is best, no two methods about it. Group supporting neighborhood,” she stated.
Baptist church opens its doorways
Only a few roads down, the Spherical Mountain Baptist Church has opened its doorways to assist cross out water, meals, and most significantly, assist folks get info. On the entrance door is an inventory of people that could also be lacking.
“Whereas it has been devastating, it is also been awe-inspiring to see the neighborhood simply band collectively and work collectively to supply area for folks to come back,” stated Katherine Waggoner, who works on the church.
Waggoner stated the best want she’s seeing proper now’s for info, assist discovering folks’s family members who haven’t but been seen for the reason that floods washed via this weekend.
“Individuals simply need to know what is going on on, they need to know the place their family members are,” she stated.