Update from Nashville

Pictures to follow but here's an update on our "adventures" in Nashville this weekend. This is a letter that Ryan's dad sent out to Ryan's brothers and sisters this morning. He sums up the situation better than I could have. I especially love his post script. We are currently taking a break from moving out of our "treehouse" and Ryan is incredulous that I am using precious time to blog. I sent him to get me a lemonade so I can furiously type this out before he gets back. 

Dear Family,

 

We just flew in from our trip to see Ryan and Anna in Nashville.  It turned out to be quite a weekend.  I am going to give you an update because I am not sure when Ryan and Anna will be back on line.

 

Let me explain.  R&A have been renting this lovely home.  Lots of property and lots of trees - big trees.  The home is furnished so they've had all their stuff in storage.  They finally decided to move their belongings to the basement of their rental a week ago last Saturday.  Wouldn't you know it started to rain and the basement leaked.  Ryan spent hours getting things up on cardboard.

 

We arrived and had beautiful weather until Saturday.  It started to rain again, pretty hard.  The leak reappeared.  We wrung out a lot of towels and then found a low spot near the foundation that was the source of the water.  The landlord arrived and reshaped the area and put plastic over it and things improved greatly.  In the mean time we had been to Home Depot where Ryan had some 2X4's cut into square blocks figuring they would be a lot better than cardboard.  By the time we arrived home it looked like the landscaping fix was working and we were out of the water even though it was still raining.  Consequently, we didn't put any blocks down.

 

Instead we went to the Grand Ole Opry and had a blast.  By this time Nashville had already had over 6" of rain. In fact, it was mentioned several times during the show that some of their backup singers and musicians had not been able to get in.  Then it started raining even harder.  The trip taking the baby sitter home was memorable.

 

Incidentally a random factoid.  Nashville's previous 24 hour record rainfall was 6.6" during a hurricane.

 

Sure enough there was more water in the basement but it still seemed containable with towels.  We went to bed.

 

Church was called off because the creek running by the building had flooded the parking lot by Saturday afternoon.

 

To jump ahead just a bit Nashville wound up with 13" of rain, double the previous record.  The place is a disaster.  The place where we took a pleasant walk on Friday, which is at least 30 feet above the Cumberland River, is under water.  The tracks of the commuter train we looked at are mangled.  The Opry Hotel where we had dinner had to evacuate 1500 guests to schools.  I will be interested to see what happened to the church.

 

Unfortunately, thousands of people were forced out of their homes.  Several members of their ward lost their homes including some of R&A's very close friends and bad news - Ryan and Anna are homeless - sort of.

 

About 10 AM Sunday during the height of the storms with water running like a river through their front yard about 50 feet from their door suddenly there was a very loud crash.  I thought "That is the loudest thunder I've ever heard."  It wasn't thunder.  A 50' Oak tree from the hill in back had toppled over on the house.  Soon the fire alarm went off and water was coming through the ceiling from holes in the roof.  It was enough to spoil your nap.  We left - in a hurry.  Ryan drove us to the first ward member they knew and without calling in advance walked up and said, "Can we come live with you?!"  (Well maybe they just asked if they could camp there for a little while.) 

 

Ryan and I went back.  The landlord and some friends from the ward also came. (Incidentally, the landlord had a foot of water in the house he is living in.  He is actually renting that place so his landlord was there trying to get the water out of his basement.) Ryan's landlord had called the fire department who never showed up.  Understandably.  They were struggling to rescue people in homes submerged in water and nobody's life was in danger at Ryan's.  Fortunately his fire alarm was a false alarm, probably caused by water in some electrical circuit.

 

We got clothes, the roast Anna had in the oven, moved furniture to rooms that weren't leaking, really put their stuff in the basement up on blocks and covered things with tarps and wished like crazy we could get that tree off the house.  Removing that tree is going to take some real expertise.  In the mean time the sister Anna was with said, "My brother-in-law lives around the comer but they are out of town for a month.  I'll see if you can stay there."  We all stayed there last night.  Fortunately R&A and kids have some place warm and dry for awhile at least.

 

I talked with Ryan a few minutes ago and they've spent the day looking for places to rent.  They think they have some good leads .

 

They have a good attitude.  They are especially grateful everyone is safe.  In the end they feel blessed and they are considering what could have happened to them and what has happened to many others.  But they have a lot of details to work through.  I am sure they would appreciate an interest in your prayers.

 

Love Dad

 

PS Nashville really is a fun place to visit.