Separated by Katrina
Vesnaa & Ray in New Orleans, Louisiana, USA.
These testimonials reflect the opinions of our users. They are not necessarily the views of Skype and have not been verified by Skype.
“Whenever there’s a Hurricane, you pack up thinking you’re going to be gone for 2 days. We’d had so many near hits and this one didn’t seem that different.
We didn’t have a lot of time to evacuate and I scattered quite quickly. Once it hit, I had evacuated to El Dorado, Arkansas because there was a room available. All I had was my basic mobile, it had a 504 (New Orleans) number so it didn’t work.
Skype became the main communication. My boyfriend Rayburn evacuated to Sun, Louisiana and the hurricane went near there. I couldn’t get in touch with him. Eventually he got to his aunts house and I was able to contact him through Skype. It was very confusing on top of that you had concerns about friends and family. You didn’t know where people were – some friends are die-hard hurricane addicts, they’ll ride out the storm! There was a lot of anxiety, and if you don’t have a means of communication that anxiety just grows. The only way you get rid of that is if you can communicate.
I was in the hotel room for a week. It took that long to establish enough contact with work and friends so I could be reassigned to Amelia, Louisiana. I have SkypeOut, and I had Voicemail during the aftermath. I received a message from a lady who lived in Homestead Florida just to reassure me it was going to get better. I didn’t even know her. Ray returned to New Orleans to help with the clear up and was also involved in rescuing abandoned animals. He was interviewed by the BBC through Skype in the aftermath.”
