Hope returns for New River family following disaster
Marc Buckhout ~ Managing Editor ~ 12/30/2009

In the Oct. 21 issue of The Foothills Focus we caught up with the Burch family of New River. Lewis, Namoye and their 13-year-old daughter Merritt have spent the last couple years sailing the world in their sailboat, Sunshine. On Sept. 30 the family was in American Samoa, where they experienced the tsunami that devastated the area. Caused by an earthquake, that measured to be a magnitude- 8.3, the tsunami, killed 32 people in American Samoa, where the Burch family had docked their boat, and another 143 in Samoa.

Recently Merritt sent an E-mail to The Foothills Focus detailing the family’s attempt to rebound after having their sailboat, Sunshine, badly damaged during the disaster.

What were we going to do now? Where were we to stay? Having carried us .50 miles inland, and now lying on her side, the tsunami had made sleeping aboard Sunshine impossible. The looters had stolen most of our possessions from on board our small sailboat. We had survived the American Samoan tidal wave but surviving the days and weeks afterward would be the real challenge.

We sat in the back of a truck as mom and I hitch hiked to a nearby undamaged hotel. As we slowly drove past the devastated village, dust from the dirt that had washed into the street blew in our eyes. The road was filled with people driving in cars and on foot looking at the damage the tsunami had caused.

The clean up crews already were clearing the roads. The huge quantities of debris would have overwhelmed the island’s landfill so workers burned thousands of pounds of trash where it was piled in the streets. The air was foul and poisonous. The wail of sirens from police cars and ambulances continued throughout the day.

During the day we stayed by the boat, but at night Sunshine was unguarded and at the mercy of the looters and vandals. Since we had no where else to stay, we lived in a hotel room for two days. What a contrast sleeping in the air conditioned hotel room made to the nearby devastation. But after those two nights Sunshine had been stripped of all her contents.

After two days of luxury in the hotel, friends invited us to stay at their home. Their youngest daughter had to give up her bedroom and sleep on the couch. While we were their guests, our Samoan hosts introduced us to a variety of foods. For instance we had turkey tails and boiled green bananas, and the leaves of the elephant ear plant cooked in coconut milk. Or some nights we had Thai food. My mom‘s from Thailand. The Sunday meal was my favorite. They feasted as if every Sunday was Thanksgiving. We had ham, turkey, cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, green bananas, raw fish, and lots of rice
We eventually hired a crane to move Sunshine from the Mormon Church parking lot where she had come to rest after the tsunami, to the marina dock a mile away. We did that because once the looters had stolen every thing they began to break things. Hiding under the shade of the boat we tried to figure out what to do next. The general feeling of fatigue and hopelessness was overwhelming.

Only three cruisers had lost their boats in the tsunami. Most of the day the homeless cruisers sat in the shade talking about the damage on their boats while trying to decide what to do. Every day when we came down to the boat the sun was scorching. Usually this island had three to four inches of rain per day. Depressed and confused, I guess we just had the lack of motivation to start working on repairing the extensive damage to the boat.

After ten days we decided to move on to the dock next to Sunshine, now lying on her side on the concrete wharf. Besides, we didn’t want to overstay the welcome of the generous people who had opened their home to us.

Another week passed and we had still done little to repair Sunshine. We had just been sitting around in a depressed and confused funk. Then one day the Red Cross came by and gave us cots, coolers, and bottles of water. Another kind gentleman gave us a tent and beds. For a couple of weeks the Red Cross even delivered three meals a day. Our camp beneath our ruined sailboat was becoming modestly comfortable.

We called our water-front camp the FEMA Yacht Club. We called it that because FEMA is a government organization that helps disaster victims. A couple weeks after the tsunami, workers from FEMA came by and gave us a tent, camping supplies, and lawn chairs that said FEMA on the backs. So on some nights we would have barbecues with the other cruisers and disaster victims. Hope was returning.

Finally, pulling our act together, we began serious work on getting ready to put Sunshine back in the water. The next day, we rented a car to get some of our salvaged cooking supplies from the Samoan home we had stayed in. We also stopped at the hardware store to buy repair materials. Though we have only started to patch the holes and cracks around the boat, something’s changed. We aren’t waiting anymore. Now we’re looking ahead instead of behind. All we really needed to begin our recovery was a positive attitude and trust in our family’s ability to overcome anything, even a natural disaster.

Go to The Foothills Focus archive at www.thefoothillsfocus.com to view the original article that ran in the Oct. 21 edition of the paper.