Last week, a group of nine people from Mount Aloysius College were caught in the Kentucky flooding while helping a school rebuild after damage from a previous flood. The National Guard took the group to dry land by boat after being stranded in that school. We spoke to three members of that group this afternoon.
While the group was able to react quickly to get to safety, reality set in later.
“Your feelings was more like energy and it wasn’t until we kind of got back, slept ate and then sat on the bus on the way back, where we started processing what really happened,” recalled MAC Assistant Athletics Director & Volleyball Coach Brianna Baker.
One student had an international phone plan that retained service despite the devastation, and he put it to good use.
“Call my parents. That was the first thing in my head, and as soon as I was able to contact both my parents, I know that they’re updated, then that’s when I was handing out my phone because I know another friend of mine that was on the trip was unable to contact their parents. The service was down,” Aloysius “Al” Lee Chun Yin remarked.
The college’s Vice President for Enrollment Management Jacob Yale says that phone saved their lives.
“You think about, you know, ‘did I charge my phone? Is it going to work whenever we need it to?’ you know, Al’s phone saved us,” he said.
Baker says the group showed composure during this scary time, and they’re bonded after this experience.
“When you go through that with people, like yeah it’s going to tie us together,” she said. “I think that’s something we’re never going to forget.”
Now that they’re safe, they’re turning their attention to help those in Kentucky who are not.
“Grateful that we survived and that we’re still here and right now, it’s just, finding ways to help them over there to recover and rebuild and do as much as we can over here to help them,”
