Not many understand the importance of “home” like I do….

It’s hard to believe it’s been 33 years since Category 5 Hurricane Andrew decimated my childhood hometown of Miami, Florida on August 24, 1992. I was born in Miami and had lived in the community of Cutler Ridge (now Cutler Bay) for 13+ years before everything was leveled in the monster storm. The days that followed were traumatic, dangerous, and uncertain.

When our neighbor was forced to shoot a looter over stealing a generator, my parents, David and Diane, made the difficult decision to send me and my two brothers to live with family in Mount Clemens, Michigan - a suburb of Detroit - over 1400 miles away, while they rebuilt - and recovered - from the storm. Our story made news headlines and still gives me chills to this day.

Here is the article, as told to the Macomb Daily, after we arrived in Mount Clemens in late August 1992….

SURVIVORS!

Nine people and two dogs huddled in a hallway 8 feet long and 4 feet wide, holding the doors to the hallway shut with all their might against the 165 mph winds that were tearing away at their house and neighborhood. This is the terrifying scene described by three siblings who were caught with their parents and a neighbor family in the middle of the destructive path of Hurricane Andrew as it ripped through southern Florida the morning of August 24th.

Courtney, Bryan, and Bradley McKay no longer live in Cutler Ridge, a suburb of Miami. Their home, like almost every other house in the neighborhood, is unliveable. The roof caved in on two of the home’s four bedrooms, and a bathroom lost its ceiling. Their neighbor’s home, across the street, where the Swihura and McKay families survived the nightmarish six hours in the hallway, waiting out the hurricane, and fearing for their lives, has only the hallway and two bedrooms left to it.

“The house was shaking real bad,” said Courtney, 13. “My mother and I were holding a door against the winds and I remember thinking, ‘you’re going to die now.’”

The children came to Mount Clemens last Friday to live with their grandmother and go to school, while their parents, David and Diane, stay in Florida to assist with the clean-up and try to rebuild the family home. Sometime in the next two weeks, Diane’s father, who is a homebuilder, and her brother, who is a roofer, both of St. Clair Shores, will travel to Florida to help rebuild the house, said Mount Clemens resident Georgia McKay, the children’s grandmother.

Bryan, 11, said the hurricane was “the scariest moment of my life.”

The McKay’s were returning from a European vacation on August 23rd when they heard the plane’s pilot announce that 150 mph winds were heading straight for Miami. “My brothers and I were very nervous,” said Courtney. “I was crying and very worried.” When the plane landed in Miami International Airport around 4 p.m., the McKay’s discovered almost everyone had already fled the city. The McKay’s did not leave Miami, which was by then a “ghost town with everything boarded up,” but went to their home in Cutler Ridge because they did not want to get tied-up in the 17-mile backup that was reported on northbound I-95.

The Swihuras - Ed, Patsy, son Edward Jr., and their 83-year-old grandmother - asked the McKay family to stay in their home during the hurricane because it was on higher ground and could better survive flooding.

Winds woke the two families around 4 a.m. Monday. The full force of the hurricane struck Cutler Ridge just 50 minutes later. “I heard a ‘boom’ from the windows blowing out,” said Courtney, “and we all screamed and ran into the hallway. Then we heard a ‘pop, pop, pop’ noise that continued until all of the windows in the house had blown out.”

At one point, they heard the garage door fall down and the wind push through the garage and against the back wall of the kitchen. The wind was so strong that it started to push a built-in microwave oven through the kitchen wall. David McKay and Edward Swihura pushed a refrigerator up against the microwave to keep it from falling out of the wall and creating a hole for wind pressure to come through and possibly cause the whole house to collapse.

The rooms of the Swihura home started to cave in one by one and the two families, along with each family’s pet dog, eventually found themselves in a small hallway, trying to keep the doors shut against the wind to preserve a pocket of air. It was there that they waited-out the hurricane.

“I was really scared, but I kept my cool,” said Bradley, 8. “My brother got stomachaches because he was so scared.”

“If it had not been for the children, I would have given up hope,” David told the children’s grandmother last week.

After the hurricane, most of the homes were still standing but inhabitable, and “99 percent of them were missing pieces of their roofs or walls,” said Courtney. Trucks and cars were turned over and the streets were flooded.

Hurricane Andrew caused $20 billion in damages and left 22 people dead in southern Florida.

“The children are adjusting, even though they’ve been through such a horrible experience,” said Georgia McKay. “I’m just thankful I can help. They’re in a good school system and the teachers have been excellent in helping them become comfortable in their new surroundings.”

All three children said it has been easy to make friends in school. They said they are happy to live with their grandmother until conditions improve in Florida because now they have the opportunity to visit with many aunts and uncles.

Written by: Ed Mandel II

My brothers and I lived in Mount Clemens through Christmas 1992 and never returned home to Miami. My father, David, a member of the U.S. Air Force’s elite Pararescue squadron, was transferred to Tyndall Air Force Base, in Panama City, Florida, in January 1993, as Homestead Air Force Base in Miami was now completely destroyed.

Though our hearts and memories were rooted in Miami, we made Panama City our home, and it is where we still live today. And it is where we would survive another Category 5 hurricane almost 25 years later….

Hurricane Michael, October 2018

On October 10, 2018, Panama City, located in northwest Florida, took an (almost) direct hit from another record-breaking hurricane, Michael. The destruction and devastation were horrific and an intense reminder of the aftermath of Andrew.

Except now, I was an adult and not a helpless child. And I had a well-established interior design business.

The effects of Andrew instilled a strong calling to help create beautiful spaces and comfortable surroundings for others. I will never forget losing the comforts of home, my bedroom, my safe spaces. Now the owner and lead designer of my company, Oak and Anchor Interiors, I was able to help with the rebuilding efforts of my community and give back in a way I could not as a child.

In the weeks, months, and years that followed, I was able to assist in the rebuilding efforts of dozens of homes, offices, churches, a school, community country club, and so much more. I would arrive to design meetings and greet grief-stricken, depressed men, women, and children who had lost it all. And I truly felt their pain.

The effects of these storms live in our memories - and bodies - for a long, long time. As a lifelong Floridian, I am aware that these storms are a very plausible risk and an almost-certain reality. Like volcanoes in Hawaii, earthquakes in California, and tornadoes in Oklahoma, hurricanes are Mother Nature’s wrath to Florida. They threaten the very things that I work so hard to create - home and harmony.

But I hope my story reminds you of this: you can - and you will - rebuild. Like any trauma in life - you will come back from this. The process can take time, but it will happen. And often, you can rebuild something better than what you had. And I’m always here to help.

If you or your family have lost your home to a natural disaster, Oak and Anchor Interiors would love to assist you through the steps and process to rebuild and bounce back. Please contact us at info@oakandanchor.com and let us know how we can help you find your way home.