Survivor Stories, Tamika
Tamika and her seven children barely escaped from their home in New Orleans.
Tamika is a native of New Orleans and has weathered several serious storms. Like many of her neighbors, she didn’t take the warnings for Hurricane Katrina as seriously as she should.
Tamika recounted what sounded like a nightmare in her efforts to escape the hurricane: a retreating to a roof to escape rising water; trying to flag the attention of rescue helicopters that retreated
due to gunfire; being stranded with thousands of people on an interstate for hours with her hungry, tired children; and losing everything, including her most prized possession of family photos, including
those of a son who passed away in 1998.
But she also talked about the good Samaritan who rescued her, her children, her parents and her autistic brother from quickly rising water and of the helicopter crew that eventually airlifted her
children to safety. And she was amazed at the kindness of strangers when she arrived in Dallas and at the quickness in which Dallas Housing Authority arranged for a temporary home for her family.
“When we got off the bus at Reunion Arena, none of us had shoes and we were covered in mud. But everyone there made sure we had everything we needed - clothes, food, medicine. And after only two
hours, Dallas Housing Authority got us a new home,” says Tamika. Her apartment in Little Mexico gives her a feeling of “safety and certainty for her children.”
Tamika is understandably weary but remarkably positive and both clam and calming. The kids are now complaining of stomach aches, probably a symptom of wandering through bacteria-ridden flood waters,
but she knows that is temporary. They are all enrolled in school, with donated supplies and uniforms. Tamika has contacted her employer and the company is working on a Dallas transfer so she can get back
to work.
She said she is happy to be in Dallas and that they will not return to New Orleans. Tamika said her children were frightened by the storm and by the actions of people they saw around them. “The kids
seem to feel safer here so we are going to stay.”
