Students return to damaged homes after Irma

Valery Linkenhoker, Staff Writer

Homes being flooded and trees falling into yards were only a few of the issues that students faced when returning home after Hurricane Irma. 

Junior Samantha Intille took advantage of hurricane Irma to take a road trip to Virginia to visit family.

“When we came back there was a dead tree in my yard,” Intille said. “It fell into my neighbor’s house, they had tiles come off of their roof and there was a pretty big dent in their gutters. Part of the tree fell into our house, it only broke the gutter though.”  

Senior Jared Hayes evacuated to Jacksonville in hopes his house would be intact when he returned.

“The initial thing I was scared about was flooding,” Hayes said. “[My family] has security cameras and we were watching it during the storm, it was like a river. I checked the roof because some of it blew off a little. Other than that it was mainly debris from trees.”

According to Assistant Principal Catherine Halbuer, the school suffered from hanging speakers and issues with air conditioning including water coming through the air conditioner to one classroom.

“The big damage was [Robert] Sarver’s portable,” Halbuer said. “The back wall on the east side was ripped off his portable. I went in and touched the wall and it was damp, the county came out and did a temporary fix.”

The materials needed to fix Sarver’s portable are on delay, and there is no estimate as to when it will be fixed.