Yutu Part One

Hey everyone, The last week has been very interesting, And I will be talking about it in a few separate posts. The first one is about my night during the Typhoon.

I will start with the day before typhoon Yutu, (btw Google “yutu” Google thinks you mean YouTube and the whole first page is different links to you to YouTube.) Anyway none of us thought it would be as bad as it was, so right before it hit us a friend and I went up North to the Cliffs of bonsai to see the waves crashing over the edge. It was pretty amazing, Cliffs are very high in the sea the waves crashing over them that's really neat. And a little scary. It's one of the few times I've ever feared the ocean. We wanted to get some good pictures and we got some. I can't share them at this time though for reasons I will explain in a later post. I do have this one  from the guy I was with, I am standing like that because the wind was so strong I would be knocked over if I didn’t brace myself.

(PC David Butterfield)
The power of the ocean was incredible though looking down at the waves it wasn't the peaceful beautiful scene we've come to enjoy at the Bonsai cliffs. Beautiful in its own way though. After that we went home and by this time to storm had gotten bad enough that the power company of shut off the power so I was in the dark. I still had my laptop so I watched a movie before I finally decided it was time for bed. At this time you could really hear the storm going outside and I wanted to make sure I slept through it so I popped a couple of Nyquil so I can fall asleep easily and in the hopes that I would be able to stay asleep. Let me tell you NyQuil is no match for typhoon Yutu.

11 PM

Around 11 things started to get really bad. I woke up to some sort of crashing outside my house and for the next 30 minutes I kept hearing all sorts of crashing noises and wasn't able to fall back asleep. Just when I thought I would be able to doze back off… I felt something. It was wet and water like. I looked above me and realized water was pouring in from my wall. Not trickling in, not dripping in, pouring in. I jumped up and moved my bed in hopes to save the mattress. (I did) I ran downstairs and grabbed a tarp to cover it up in case more area started leaking.

12-1 AM

I was downstairs walking around looking outside wishing I could be out in the storm. I was standing in my kitchen A little later this point I was sitting on the couch talking to the principal to see how things were going at the other staff housing this was maybe 12 or 1 a.m.. while I was talking to him I heard a really loud ripping noise and as I was sitting on the couch I started feeling a drip and I told him “I think my roof just blew away”. I went upstairs and looked out the window at my roof and sure enough the tin had all come up. Thankfully the rest of the roof wasn't exposed to the sky but it still let in a whole lot of water. And praise God the roof only came up at my house and the unit next to me the ripping stopped before it got there. Water started leaking all over my couch so I grabbed another tarp to protect that. Then Water started pouring in through my ceiling fan, guess I won't be able to use that again, so I grabbed some buckets and tried to catch the water.

Periodically I would get up and look outside to see what kind of damage the storm has done. one of these times I open my door there was a huge ceiling from our neighbor in front of my door as well as a couple trees. Those of you who know me know I had to go outside to see where it came from. The wind was so bad in the rain was just pouring in like bullets and I was soaked instantly. my fear got the better of me and I went back inside.

At this point I thought things were dying down so with no other place to go I sat down in the kitchen. And as I was sitting there kind of looking at my phone talking to a few other people who are going through the storm, I heard a loud crash outside my house and something flew off the wall and hit me. Nothing big but enough for me to think maybe I shouldn't sit here anymore. I later found out what had hit my wall was a tree branch and the reason something on the inside hit me is the tree branch went completely through my wall.

2-3 AM

After the branch went through my wall, I pulled everything out of my hot water heater closet  and sat in there, singing hymns and reading bible verses and praying to try to take my mind off what was going on outside. I really wanted to be out in the storm but one it was night and even if I went out, it was too dark to see anything, and two, probably to dangerous to be out in it anyway, you’re welcome mom.  Some people are saying now that we had 180+ mph sustained winds. Which is pretty rough. After a few hours of this I made a bed on the ground of the closet to try to get some more sleep. I took another dose of NyQuil to try to fall asleep as I was just tired of being awake.

4-6 AM

I tried my best to fall asleep but the best I could do was my body was sleeping but my mind was fully awake hearing every sound wondering what I was hearing. It was not a restful night.

7 AM

Needless to say I didn't get much sleep that night When it was light I went outside, while it was still windy It was now safe enough to go outside and look around. Poles were down everywhere, Trees gone, homes completely destroyed. Pieces of others houses in my yard. My island home was unrecognizable.

To be continued….

Before I end, I want to talk about what God did for us that night, specifically at our compound. Now the storm hit the south part of the island the worst, That’s the area I live in, And I may have mentioned this in another post but our houses are not build very strong, they were quick “kit houses” that were build over 40 years ago. Most houses here are brick and concrete.  Not ours, they have thin metal studs for the frame. Styrofoam in between the studs, paneling on the ouside and Sheetrock on the inside, under normal conditions those things should fly away if a butterfly blows a kiss at it, I could feel my walls shaking, I could see the walls flexing under the wind. The homes around us are gone. Home with concrete walls were smashed in. There is only one thing that kept that house standing during this storm and that was God, There is no other way those houses didn’t fly away. The winds we had, I looked out my window and thought my truck was going to flip over the way it was shaking, and some of cars in other areas did flip over. For us to have such little damage, most of our apartments didn’t have any real damage at all. God was protecting us. I was asked “where was God” when showing pictures of the aftermath, One of the places He was with me, and the other teacher who chose to brave the storm at our compound, protecting our little mission houses. Seeing the destruction around me, I know God was watching out for meHe was may other places as well but you will have to read part 2 for that.