Main fundraiser photo

Support the De La Cruz Family Recover from Flood Devastation

Donation protected
Hello, my name is Ihojan and I'm here to see if I am able to raise some money for our family that just went through the recent Texas floods in the forgotten area of Sandy Creek. The floods started on July 5th, dead in the night at 3:20 am, when my mom luckily woke us all up slightly before water started coming inside our home. This allowed us to come up with an escape plan, but unfortunately, the water was already at an aggressive speed. We were worried to cross since we could barely see with the small flashlights we managed to find. So, we decided to try and plug doorways and AC vents, but by the time we got a few plugged, the water was at our ankles. We realized this water was coming too fast and we needed to make it to the roof and hope for rescue. Luckily, my bedroom is on an extended part of the house we built, which had a second floor with a window access to the roof. I got them all out on the roof when I remembered I had a small raft for when I would go out camping. So, I went back inside to grab more flashlights, some shoes, and the raft. As we stood on top of our home, getting blinded by the harsh rain that seemed to never let up, we started to inflate the raft as a backup plan in case the house also got swept up. At least we would have something to stay out of the water with. As we surveyed the water levels and noticed they were insanely high, up to 6 feet high on the backside of our house, we got more scared and wanted to come up with plans on what to do. But at that moment, we heard our neighbors on the right of us yelling from inside their homes, asking for help and banging on their windows. It felt horrible not being able to do anything with us being on the roof with nothing but flashlights and a half-inflated raft. The water level was so high, we could just try and shine some lights near them and see if we could help with at least that, but the water was just so fast. Sadly, we could only sit there and listen. At that moment, I got a text from a friend asking how we were doing since he lives up the street, higher up the neighborhood. I asked Siri to call him, and it was going through, but I could barely hear with the rain. I could imagine it was the same on the other side, so I was just asking him to call the firemen because there's a station within 7 minutes away, and hopefully, they could come and help the neighbors and then get us off the roof. It was something to hope for. After what felt like 20 minutes since we got onto the roof, we noticed some people on the roads and realized it might be help for our neighbors. So, we tried giving them some light as they tied themselves with ropes and walked over to the neighbor's house to try and get the family out. At that moment, it gave us some ideas to see if we could also cross, but our main problem was to get off the roof safely. We noticed the water levels finally started lowering on the backside of the house, so we tried looking around for some way down. At that moment, the neighbor's family that helped them out started walking over, which we then asked to help us with a ladder we had on the front porch. They were thankfully able to put it up for us and held it while I helped my dad down. While they held the ladder, I then started to walk my sisters one by one so I could hold on to them better. I felt extremely bad as I had never wanted them to be in a situation like this, but I had to help as much as I could to get them down safely at least. After we finally got down, I held my sister's hand to make sure she didn't trip on what we didn't know was under the water. After we made it on the road, we thanked the helpers as they were very helpful to save our lives and asked if they could take us somewhere, which we agreed to until we saw our front door neighbors who know where my grandparents live. As we walked over to their house, we noticed the water picked up again, so we hurried over more as we didn't want to know what could happen if the water rose again. Even on the road, the water was strong. I held on to my sister tight because even I was feeling the strength of the water and didn't want them to trip. After we finally made it to higher ground, it finally felt good. Even if I could barely see because of the rain on my glasses, I couldn't feel the water level on my legs anymore. When our neighbors took us to our grandparents' house, there was finally a chance to breathe. Even if we were drenched in water, it still felt safe finally, and we were grateful we all made it out safely and all our neighbors also made it out safely. All of this, and it was then 4:07 after all that happened. After we managed to sleep maybe an hour or two after all that shock finally leveled out, we went over to where our mobile house was completely flooded inside and dropped off its foundation. Our 2-story workshop was completely swept away and destroyed, which is where we used to work out of, and our 4 vehicles, which included 2 of our work vans. This is why we aren't able to make any money at the moment, and we would greatly appreciate any donations to help get us on our feet again with starting to work again and make up for our lost house, workshop, and all the tools we had in the workshop that we have bought in the last 20 years that we have lived here. Mostly, we would love to be able to replace those as quickly as possible to get back to working and building with, and I'm very thankful for any donation as this will all go into my family and everything they need at the moment while we try to get back on our feet.
Donate

Donations 

    Donate

    Organizer and beneficiary

    Ihojan delacruz
    Organizer
    Leander, TX
    Miguel Mendoza Mondragon
    Beneficiary

    Your easy, powerful, and trusted home for help

    • Easy

      Donate quickly and easily

    • Powerful

      Send help right to the people and causes you care about

    • Trusted

      Your donation is protected by the GoFundMe Giving Guarantee