Louisiana father works to rebuild community after two hurricanes

Ten months ago, Hurricanes Laura and Delta devastated the community of Calcasieu Parish in southwest Louisiana. As the cleanup began, one father told The Weather Channel’s Tevin Wooten that repairing his own home wasn’t enough.

Michael Johnson said that destruction from the hurricanes was devastating to his family and community.

“It’s like an ongoing, never-ending ordeal,” he told Wooten. “I’m beaten. It’s been pretty tough.”

Johnson’s home was at one point uninhabitable. He dealt with mold after the hurricanes and in February, an uncharacteristic deep freeze in the area. And then, record rainfall.

“The water was so high,” Johnson said, “I had a boat come rescue my dad.”

Fortunately, Johnson is a tradesman and entrepreneur who could do many of his own repairs. But for those who could not, he wanted to help them as well.

“In order for me and my son to get back to normal, we can’t just fix our house,” Johnson, a single father, told Wooten. “This is the whole community. In order to get back to normal, we got to get everybody up and running.”

Johnson and the rest of the Calcasieu Parish community were assisted in that effort by World Changers, a Christian organization that sends students on week-long missions to aid in construction and other projects.

Their mission was part of the Lake Charles Hurricane relief effort to help rebuild the beleaguered region battered by the two storms.

“If we all take care of each other, then we’re all taken care of,” Johnson says.

Watch the video above for more on Johnson’s ordeal.

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