Drone footage showed people kayaking under the freshman underpass during the mid-March flooding, but others from the university had a much different experience.
According to the Associated Press, flooding damaged at least 4,958 homes in Louisiana and the exact count is expected to rise. Rivers in Southeast Louisiana had record crests after the Thursday night of the storms. Many of these rivers run through areas where students and faculty live.
According to weather.com, the flooding came after an unusual weather pattern caused record amounts of rainfall in the Southeast. It started Monday night in Texas and over 26 inches fell in Monroe, Louisiana.
The record amount of rainwater made its way through Louisiana’s rivers, streams and eventually into people’s homes. This is what happened to freshman computer science major Ethan Morgan, who didn’t expect the flood.
“There is a creek that runs behind our house and every time it rains it floods real bad,” said Morgan. “Every time it rains it floods the yard a little bit, but this time, it was a whole lot worse than normal. It just kept rising and rising.”
Morgan said the floods came around 1:30 a.m. on Thursday night. He was half asleep and had to swim out of his house. The next day, they found the water to have risen to up to three feet in his house. He estimated it to be nearly seven feet in his yard.
Morgan is from Chesbrough, which is almost 30 miles from the university. The town sits next to the Tangipahoa River, which crested to its third highest level.
Morgan said he saw the water rise two feet in the time it took him to try to secure everything. Along with trying to save belongings, Morgan’s family has horses, two dogs and a cat he had to save before the flooding became too difficult to manage.
“We were up all night Thursday night,” said Morgan. “We didn’t sleep any trying to get horses out and whatever animals we can get out of there.”
Morgan said there was a strong current, which made it difficult for him to help the animals escape.
“I didn’t think I was going to be able to stay on my feet trying to get back,” said Morgan.
The flooding destroyed infrastructure as well as people’s homes causing detours across Southeast Louisiana. This prompted the university to send out a notice, which reminded students to tell professors if they were not going be able to make it to class on Monday.
The detours also affected instructors. Department of English instructor Mary Mocsary faced a detour to the university after a section of a bridge over the Tangipahoa collapsed. She took an alternate route in the morning, but by the afternoon, the flooding destroyed a section of her alternate route.
“I didn’t know how to get home,” said Mocsary.
Mocsary said she called her husband. He was able to guide her home with the help of a police officer. The next morning she forgot her route and became lost. She eventually found her way and made it to class at 8:00 a.m.
Mocsary doesn’t expect the bridge on her normal route to be fixed in the near future. Although she is uncertain of the future of the infrastructure, she mentioned the difficulties others may be facing.
“We can only imagine the grief that people are experiencing who’ve had damage to their homes,” said Mocsary. “Plus have the burden and the stress of not quite knowing how you’re going to get to work or get home.”
Morgan says that going to class gives him relief by providing him with something to take his mind off of what happened.
Morgan is in the Air National Guard but was not activated for the flooding.