Cyclone Evan

 

Wednesday, December 19, 2012  Cyclone Evan

I know I just posted about our fun trip to Savai'i but I wanted to post pictures from our Cyclone Evan that hit last Thursday December13, 2012.

We had not heard anything about any cyclone until Wednesday night the 12th we had a ladies painting activity.  One of the sisters said she heard we could have a cyclone coming our way.  Another sister who has served here with her husband before said she heard that sometimes after a big storm power could be off for a month.  That was about all that was said.  No biggy!  Then Thursday the 13th as Elder Spencer and I were leaving to go to the office our Zone Leader, Elder, Gertsch, came out and told us that all mission vehicles were grounded for the day in case of a cyclone.

The power in our house went out just after 9 a.m. so we walked over to the office and they had power.  They have a big generator that kicked on so we basically stayed at the office all day.  Reed walked over to the store to buy some candles and matches because we had nothing but one small flashlight.  Around 2:30 p.m. all heck broke loose.  The wind was knocking down trees and the rain was coming so hard it was blowing in under the doors and through the louvered windows.  We kept trying to push it out not realizing that the same thing was happening at home.  Finally at 5:00 p.m. Elder Gertsch ran over here with his car and took us home.  Reed's glasses blew off his face and the wind was pushing me all over the place.  When we got home there was water and mud pouring in our windows.  Well for the next 15 hours we mopped, cleaned, mopped, tried to block the windows from letting so much water in.  (Later we learned the locals put up tarps or wood but nobody told us anything.)  We got very little sleep.  The wind blew so hard, as you layed in bed, you could feel spray hitting you.  I was afraid the wind was going to blow the windows out.  It was a long night and long day on Friday.  A lot of clean up and worrying.  We survived a category 2 cyclone and really hope to not be in anymore. 

On Saturday December 15, 2012 we decided to do some driving around.  Following are pictures we took of the destruction.  The biggest problem was the wind downed trees and then the water carried them into the rivers and they blocked up the river and it overflowed.  What a mess.  Thousands of people are displaced because their homes were totally destroyed.  The problem now is still no power unless you have a generator and clean water supplies are getting low.  A little scary.

 Half of this tree just snapped right off.  This tree is also on our campus.

The positive thing is people are out helping each other clean up and we haven't seen any looting or price gouging.  They have cleaned out their stores and houses where they can and are trying to get back on their feet.  This tree is right outside the building we work in.  They call this building the White House.

We walk across this field to get to our office.  That tree fell minutes after Reed ran past it bringing our frozen food over here to the fridge running off the generator.  You can see the palm trees blowing in the wind.

 When we first got home at 5:00 p.m. this messy green/brown water was all over the curtains and running down the walls and under the furniture.  Reed took this picture after we had already cleaned everything up once and moved the furniture and opened the drapes all the way.  We battled with this for the next 15 hours.  The water just built up in the window seal and then came over the top of the bottom louvered window.  YUCK!

You can see how far the water kept running to.  That was after mopping every hour and ringing out towels to lay them back down.  It was a long night and morning.

This tree is one we walk or drive past every time we leave our house.  It just snapped right off at the base.  This was all within 2 hours after the wind really started to blow.

 This is what our back yard looked like when we got home.  The frangi pani tree is split in half, some palm trees are down, leaves everywhere, our beautiful bougainvillea tree is ripped out at the roots behind that water storage tank.

On Friday morning Reed walked around the campus a little bit.  This is the road right in front of our office and the road coming through the gate onto campus.  This is the gate we mostly use because it is closest to our house.  You cannot see the road at all.  It is a river.

You can see that all the banana trees across the street from our work building are destroyed.  They say most the banana trees on the island look like this or worse.  Bananas are a main food source here.  They will take at least 6 months to grow.  You can see all the water running down the road and into their plantation.  This was as far as we ventured on Friday.  Finally on Saturday we could get in the car and drive around Apia a bit.

 

 This is one of the stores on Vaitele. the main road through Apia.  They are pushing out mud and water and pulling out wet things.

 This is the beach road right by Apia harbor in front of some of the govenrment buildings.

 This river runs under this bridge into Apia harbor.  You can see all the logs that have been washed down and hence damned the river.  They are saying there was also a 15 foot surge of the ocean.

The big resort Aggie Greys is the building you can see there.  Their underground parking was to the ceiling in mud and water.  You can see the broken wall and fence off to the left of the bridge.

There is still standing water all over by the river and ocean front.  Roofs were blown off and houses smashed.

You can see how brown the ocean is.  Usually this is clear blue water.

Now we are where the rivers overflowed and smashed cars, houses, trees, what a devastation.

 This picture was on the MSN news page.  We are so grateful that more lives were not taken.  The blessing is this happend before people went to bed so they could get out.  If it would have happened in the middle of the night probably hundreds of lives would have been lost.

 People who have lived here all their lives say they have never seen the river get blocked and overflow like this.  This is the worst disaster in over 100 years for this island.  We have not been to the South East side but they are saying that they got hit even worse.  There has been no power anywhere on the island since the 13th unless you have a generator.

This is driving on street three.  Apparantly on Friday you could not even get down this street so the waters have gone down some.

 This is Samoa College (high school).  It is the elite college on Upolu.  There are displaced families living in all the rooms.  You can see people and their things at the windows.

 This is the business called Scoops.  This is where we go when we want to buy ice cream cones.  You can see that they have a lot of mud and water.

We have been cleaning out our office and the whole learning center (white house).  They kept saying the cleaning people would be here but after four days we couldn't take the mess or smell anymore so we brought over our buckets and lysol and bailed water then cleaned and mopped.  It looks and smells so much better.  Last night some of the places around us actually got power so hopefully we will soon.  The five of us senior couples without power have been seing "All We Want for Christmas is our Power On!"

We hope you all have a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.  We won't blog again until after the Holidays unless something major changes here.  We are so grateful for the blessings we enjoy. We feel like we have been protected.  We still have to go through hard things but the way we handle them and trust in the Lord helps a lot. We love the Gospel and our family.  Until next time.

Love Elder and Sister Spencer

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Today is Tuesday, December 18, 2012.  We have had a few very wild and scary days.  We had a category 2 Cyclone hit Upolo and it has been a mess.  When we get our pictures together I will blog about that.  Right now we are without power and have been since Thursday the 13th.  They are telling us it could be two to 5 weeks before they have power up and running.  Could be interesting.  We have a generator at our office so we are hurrying to touch base in case they shut that down.

We want to blog about two fun things we did the past couple of weeks and then later when we have power and pictures we'll tell you all about the Cyclone!

On Saturday, December 1, 2012 we drove to the south side of the island to find a beach called Old Hideaway Beach.  It took some looking but we found it.  Beautiful!  The beach was the best we've been on so far and the water was great.  It stayed shallow for a long way out and the snorkeling wasn't real great, however, to just swim and play in the water it was great.  We had a lot of rain but no thunder and lightening this time.  You are already wet in the ocean so the rain doesn't bother you.  We all got so sunburned.  We didn't think to put on sunscreen because of all the rain but we paid for that decision.  We found a lot of great seashells and quite a few sand dollars.  It was a very fun day.  We also found a black sand beach but it was not very good snorkeling or swimming there.

 

 

On Thursday, December 6, 2012 we got up at 4:00 a.m. and caught the 6:00 a.m. ferry to go to Savai'i for a little vacation.  We went with Elder and Sister Osborne and Elder and Sister Budgett met us at the ferry in Savai'i and drove us all around.  First stop Afu Aau Waterfall.  It was only 8:30 a.m. but Reed and Joe decided they were going to go swimming.  Not quite warm enough for the rest of us.

 

Reed and Joe never swim without their shirts but it was so early and mostly in the shade so they did this time so they had dry shirts to put on.

This is a fresh water pond and the waterfall depends on rainfall.  They said the water was quite cool but refreshing.

 

Then we headed to a black sand beach called Nuu.  It was a beautiful beach and the waves were very nice.  These men were taking sand to spread in their village.  That is something they do on all the Islands.

This man kept following us down the beach until Reed turned around and took his picture.  Then he just smiled and went back to digging up the sand.

 

 You can see Reed standing by the blow holes.  You could get right next to them if you wanted to.

 Then we headed to the Alofaaga blow holes.  It cost 10 Tala per couple to drive down there.  They were going off like crazy.  There were probably four of them you could walk up to and others you could see.  It was a lot of fun.

 

Jim was trying to throw a coconut into the hole so it would shoot it out.  If you pay a local guy 10 Tala he will do it but they had both seen it done before and we didn't want to pay this time.  Needless to say it didn't work real well for Jim!

We then headed for the Canopy Walk.  You can see the stairs we had to climb up and then we walked across the rope and netting bridge.  I was fine until Reed got on it behind me and started bouncing it.  That was a little scary.

Our son Kip would have loved this tree house.  It had numerous levels and just kept going up and up.  Once you got to the top you could see all over Savai'i and the ocean.  Beautiful.  It was a fun experience.  Very clean and very well taken care of it.  It cost 20 Tala a person to do this.  We then drove along the ocean and stopped and had a picnic lunch.  While we were eating we kept watching a porpoise jumping out in the ocean.  That was fun.  Then we drove around to the North side of the island to our resort the Le Logoto.  It was very nice.  We each had our own bungalow right on the beach.  They had a swimming pool about 20 feet from our bungalow and a 3 minute walk to the beach to snorkel.  Fabulous!  The snorkeling was the best we've had so far here in Samoa and swimming in the regular pool was very nice as well.

 

Elder and Sister Budgett, Osborne and Spencer having dinner in the dining fale.  It was beautifully done.  The food was good and we had a nice program with local singers and dances.  It was traditional Samoan food and they call this a fia fia (party, celebratition!)  The weather was very nice, not too hot!

 This is the swimming pool and the ocean is off to the right.  The bungalow closest to the pool, where you can see the lounge chair, was #2.  That is where Reed and Nada stayed.

The snorkeling was the best we've had.  There were lots and lots of fish.  There were a lot of schools of fish and just so much beautiful different coral.  It was a snorkelers (Reed's) dream come true.

There was this beautifu purple coral and the water was so clear.

 You can see the school of yellow and brown striped fish here.  They were all over.  We haven't seen very many of these any place else.

This is the beautiful sunset we watched from the dining room fale while the fia fia was going on.  Beautiful!!!

This is the front deck of our bungalow.  We watched and listened to the waves all during the night and day.  It was wonderful. 

On Friday morning December 7th we got up and went for a walk on the beach and then Reed went snorkeling for a short time.  We had a wonderful breakfast and then headed out to the Saleaula Lava Ruins.  They had a 1905 and 1911 Volcano eruption and the lava covered a lot of the island.

 

 

 The lava flowed through the back of the LMS (London Missionary Society) church and towards the front.  You can see that the lava is thicker in the back and more shallow towards the front.

 They call this the Virgin Grave.  The lava flowed all around this grave and if you look down inside you can see where the grave is.

 You can see the interesting patterns that the lava formed.  There is vegetation growing through cracks and holes all over the ruins.

We then went to swim with the turtles.  Reed was the only one that actually got in the water to swim.  Afterwards, Elder Osborne said he didn't swim because he was told the water wasn't cleaned often and you could get Salmonella from swimming in it.  Thanks a lot, Joe.  Reed has not been sick so he is glad he did it.

We fed the turtles papaya.  They kept swimming up to the surface so I fed them and touched their shells.  They felt a little bit like a slimy rock.  It was fun.

We then drove to Viola which is the church school on Savai'i.  They have a primary and a college (high school) with about 480 students total.  Elder and Sister Budgett are the ITEP missionaries there.  It was a very nice little campus.  It is almost like being in the mountains.  We had lunch at their home and then took the 4:00 p.m. ferry back to Upolu.  We had a great little vacation.

We hope you enjoyed taking this little vacation with us.  We had a great time and saw some very beautiful things.

We love you all.  Until next time,
Elder and Sister Spencer (Reed and Nada)