Please help out and donate to this family if you can, Here is their link to their GoFundMe page https://www.gofundme.com/Darrenk218
where you can donate and find out more info, Let's help this family reach their goal!
Here is Darren Kurz heartbreaking story:
"Vehicle, fuel and clothing expenses
My
name is Darren Kurz and I live in Port Aransas Texas
On August 25th 2017 Hurricane Harvey made landfall right on top of the small cities of Port Aransas Texas, Aransas Pass and Rockport as a Category 4 Storm.
The winds in Port Aransas clocked in at 132 mph according to a couple of different official sources that I have located but as it turned out the wind wasn't what we needed to worry about, it was the rising flood waters.
The worst part out of all of this, even worse than losing my car was the loss of our family pet, our beautiful cat Mewkie, who disappeared out of the door prior to the outer bands arriving and would not heed my calls to come back. I have been back to my condo several times since then and he is nowhere to be found and he isn't one to miss a meal.
On August 25th 2017 Hurricane Harvey made landfall right on top of the small cities of Port Aransas Texas, Aransas Pass and Rockport as a Category 4 Storm.
The winds in Port Aransas clocked in at 132 mph according to a couple of different official sources that I have located but as it turned out the wind wasn't what we needed to worry about, it was the rising flood waters.
The worst part out of all of this, even worse than losing my car was the loss of our family pet, our beautiful cat Mewkie, who disappeared out of the door prior to the outer bands arriving and would not heed my calls to come back. I have been back to my condo several times since then and he is nowhere to be found and he isn't one to miss a meal.
I
did everything that I thought that I could do to prepare for a storm
like this before the summer even began. I stocked up on water, (10
cases) food, rice, dry goods, I bought dry ice the day of the storm
and even obtained several empty sandbags and went to the beach and
filled them up myself but nothing I did could prepare me for
what was to come on that fateful evening of August 25th.
As my son and I waited the storm out in our bottom floor two bedroom apartment that sits about one half mile from the beach, we were optimistic that our days/weeks/months of preparation would see us through and we would emerge unscathed but mother nature had other plans.
At around 4 pm our power started to flicker, so one gentleman who owns a store on the island, offered us the stores generator if we could just get to it but as I got into my car and attempted to exit the parking lot of my building, I realized that the street that I live on was already at about 18 to 24 inches deep and my car (which I had just purchased 6 weeks prior) would not make it, so we were basically locked in and even if we wanted to leave at that point, we couldn't.
As the Sun went down and our power went out, my son and I set in the dark, peering out of the window, watching the rain come down but while we were distracted with what was going on in the front, the back door was beginning to fail, even with the sand bags, water was pouring in around the seals and the door was bowing inwards.
We jumped up, ran to the door to pile cases of water and anything else with some weight to it to keep it from collapsing in, and then I noticed water flowing out of my bedroom door as well. Yep, the sewage had backed up in my shower and toilet and septic water was now pouring into our home and there was nothing that we could do to stop it.
Ironically enough, while our attention was focused on the BACK part of the home, My son, Robert, ran to the front and he yelled "Dad your car is floating away and I can see the tail lights of another car that apparently tried to drive through it and I think that I can hear a woman screaming"
I ran to the front window and sure enough, my car was bobbing like a fishing cork and right next to it was another car with the tail lights lit up and I too heard what I thought was a woman crying for help.
At that point, I instructed my son to call 911 (I knew it was a waste of time) and I was going to try and go outside to see if someone was actually there and to offer my assistance if there was but just about when I was going to breach the window, I realized what we heard was actually the wind howling and the car that was floating next to mine, was actually my sons Camry and the lights had come on due to the alarm system.
It was a bittersweet revelation, I was very happy that no person was actually in danger but at the same time, I was very despondent that our cars were basically floating across the parking lot and towards the canal in front of our building.
Soon after this occurred, I noticed that my front door sandbags were also failing and like the back door, it was beginning to bow in like it was going to break through the dead bolts and release a torrent of flood water in on us.
For the first time since this ordeal began, I began to get pretty frightened as my biggest fear was a torrent of water bursting in, knocking us down and not allowing us to escape the room while the waters kept rising, I thought we would end up drowning, trapped like rats in our own apartment.
It was that time that I made the decision instruct my son that it was time to go and to help me get the few things that we could carry on our backs and force open the now swollen windows and escape out into the then waste deep water and climb up the balcony to the apartment above us and ride out the rest of the storm outside in the howling 100+ mph wind and in the rain that was coming down so hard that it was blowing sideways, each droplet was the size of a nickel and felt like, what I can only describe as paintballs striking our bare skin.
We waited what seemed like an eternity but finally the water began to recede, the wind began to slow down, the rain eased up to heavy drizzle and the beautiful sight of the Sunshine began to appear on the horizon.
We had just endured a near direct hit by Hurricane Harvey, a 135mph Category 4 storm and had escaped with our lives which was the greatest gift of all but unfortunately, we had lost everything that we had worked so hard for over the past several years.
All of our clothes were floating in sewage laced saltwater, all of our dry foods were now floating around in the same water, all of our electronics, 4 Tvs, an Xbox One, two Xbox 360's, furniture, brand new beds, laptops, everything gone in the course of about 8 hours.
We escaped with the clothes on our backs and the shoes on our feet but we were still alive and that's the most important thing.
I hate asking for help or charity or handouts of any kind but what we are now needing to help us, once again, become self sufficient and self reliant is help getting obtaining enough donations for both of us to obtain replacement vehicles so that we can start getting back to our jobs and to buy some clothes and other essential items until we can get back on our feet.
Our apartment is obviously not habitable and won't be again for about 4 to 6 months so help in hotel/short term rentals will also need to be addressed as well.
I know some of you will say: What about FEMA, well that's what I am asking myself too. It has already been over 2 weeks now and I have yet to see a single penny from FEMA, and neither has my son, both of our applications have been stuck at "pending" for a week now and to top it off, they even directed us to the SBA for a loan, which we were both promptly turned down for.
The donations that I may receive through this campaign will go directly to helping to rebuild my life and my son, Roberts life and help us to get back to the way we were before this awful tragedy happened.
Here are some pics from our home and vehicles http://imgur.com/a/blewM "
As my son and I waited the storm out in our bottom floor two bedroom apartment that sits about one half mile from the beach, we were optimistic that our days/weeks/months of preparation would see us through and we would emerge unscathed but mother nature had other plans.
At around 4 pm our power started to flicker, so one gentleman who owns a store on the island, offered us the stores generator if we could just get to it but as I got into my car and attempted to exit the parking lot of my building, I realized that the street that I live on was already at about 18 to 24 inches deep and my car (which I had just purchased 6 weeks prior) would not make it, so we were basically locked in and even if we wanted to leave at that point, we couldn't.
As the Sun went down and our power went out, my son and I set in the dark, peering out of the window, watching the rain come down but while we were distracted with what was going on in the front, the back door was beginning to fail, even with the sand bags, water was pouring in around the seals and the door was bowing inwards.
We jumped up, ran to the door to pile cases of water and anything else with some weight to it to keep it from collapsing in, and then I noticed water flowing out of my bedroom door as well. Yep, the sewage had backed up in my shower and toilet and septic water was now pouring into our home and there was nothing that we could do to stop it.
Ironically enough, while our attention was focused on the BACK part of the home, My son, Robert, ran to the front and he yelled "Dad your car is floating away and I can see the tail lights of another car that apparently tried to drive through it and I think that I can hear a woman screaming"
I ran to the front window and sure enough, my car was bobbing like a fishing cork and right next to it was another car with the tail lights lit up and I too heard what I thought was a woman crying for help.
At that point, I instructed my son to call 911 (I knew it was a waste of time) and I was going to try and go outside to see if someone was actually there and to offer my assistance if there was but just about when I was going to breach the window, I realized what we heard was actually the wind howling and the car that was floating next to mine, was actually my sons Camry and the lights had come on due to the alarm system.
It was a bittersweet revelation, I was very happy that no person was actually in danger but at the same time, I was very despondent that our cars were basically floating across the parking lot and towards the canal in front of our building.
Soon after this occurred, I noticed that my front door sandbags were also failing and like the back door, it was beginning to bow in like it was going to break through the dead bolts and release a torrent of flood water in on us.
For the first time since this ordeal began, I began to get pretty frightened as my biggest fear was a torrent of water bursting in, knocking us down and not allowing us to escape the room while the waters kept rising, I thought we would end up drowning, trapped like rats in our own apartment.
It was that time that I made the decision instruct my son that it was time to go and to help me get the few things that we could carry on our backs and force open the now swollen windows and escape out into the then waste deep water and climb up the balcony to the apartment above us and ride out the rest of the storm outside in the howling 100+ mph wind and in the rain that was coming down so hard that it was blowing sideways, each droplet was the size of a nickel and felt like, what I can only describe as paintballs striking our bare skin.
We waited what seemed like an eternity but finally the water began to recede, the wind began to slow down, the rain eased up to heavy drizzle and the beautiful sight of the Sunshine began to appear on the horizon.
We had just endured a near direct hit by Hurricane Harvey, a 135mph Category 4 storm and had escaped with our lives which was the greatest gift of all but unfortunately, we had lost everything that we had worked so hard for over the past several years.
All of our clothes were floating in sewage laced saltwater, all of our dry foods were now floating around in the same water, all of our electronics, 4 Tvs, an Xbox One, two Xbox 360's, furniture, brand new beds, laptops, everything gone in the course of about 8 hours.
We escaped with the clothes on our backs and the shoes on our feet but we were still alive and that's the most important thing.
I hate asking for help or charity or handouts of any kind but what we are now needing to help us, once again, become self sufficient and self reliant is help getting obtaining enough donations for both of us to obtain replacement vehicles so that we can start getting back to our jobs and to buy some clothes and other essential items until we can get back on our feet.
Our apartment is obviously not habitable and won't be again for about 4 to 6 months so help in hotel/short term rentals will also need to be addressed as well.
I know some of you will say: What about FEMA, well that's what I am asking myself too. It has already been over 2 weeks now and I have yet to see a single penny from FEMA, and neither has my son, both of our applications have been stuck at "pending" for a week now and to top it off, they even directed us to the SBA for a loan, which we were both promptly turned down for.
The donations that I may receive through this campaign will go directly to helping to rebuild my life and my son, Roberts life and help us to get back to the way we were before this awful tragedy happened.
Here are some pics from our home and vehicles http://imgur.com/a/blewM "
Once again, Let's help this family out and help them reach their goal, I'll post an update to the story once they've met it. donate here https://www.gofundme.com/Darrenk218
Just one of many families in need of help. signing off for now, Pay it forward.
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