LAKELAND — Mario Cruz crouched next to a single-wide trailer Wednesday afternoon, holding a drill to attach baseboards to the unit that serves as a home for his granddaughter, her partner and their four children.
It was a small and symbolic gesture two weeks after Hurricane Milton hurled a punishing torrent of water through the Pine Lake mobile home park in North Lakeland.
Daniel Torres, Cruz’s granddaughter’s partner, appreciated the effort to give the home some dignity. But he knew his family needed much more help to overcome the many adversities Milton had dealt them.
The deluge inundated the banks of a ditch running through the mobile home park, and the flood destroyed Torres’ car and that of his girlfriend. With both of their cars inoperable, the couple could no longer work as Uber drivers.
Torres said his family — including children ages 9, 10, 14 and 16 — moved from Connecticut to Lakeland about six months ago. Standing next to the mobile home, Torres recalled the unforeseen devastation the hurricane brought.
“It’s really bad here,” said Torres, 40. “All the water is rising. Lots of water in the house. We lose almost everything. We are losing the cars.”
Torres stared at US 98, about 100 feet away. Just off the four-lane highway was a large pile of destroyed and discarded belongings, including belongings that Torres and his family had been forced to throw away.
The hurricane’s brutal rainfall dumped about four feet of water into the mobile home, Torres said, destroying a refrigerator, stove, furniture, doors, floors and more.
“The water started pouring into the house and I grabbed the kids,” Torres said. ‘I called my friend, he has a big truck. So we have to get out of here, swimming. It’s crazy.”
The younger children cried in fear during the evacuation, but two weeks later they seemed to be doing well, Torres said.
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The water engulfed the family’s vehicles, a Kia Sorrento and a Mercedes-Benz. Torres said he and his partner both owe money on the cars, and he worries they won’t receive enough insurance payments to cover their debts and buy new vehicles.
“So now we’re just waiting on FEMA,” Torres said. “The lien in this house is not in my name yet, so FEMA is not going to cover anything that has been destroyed in the house, like walls, doors and all this stuff. So we have to solve it ourselves.”
Concerned about mold growing, the family cleaned the inside of the trailer with bleach, Torres said.
Visions of floating cars
A few steps away on C Street, David Ferron stood outside his single-wide mobile home as a few cats romped in the grass. Puddles remained at the edge of Ferron’s garden.
“I left part of the way through the storm,” said Ferron, 71. “I got in my car because when the water came up, I said, ‘My car is going to get destroyed eventually.’ But I stayed close.”
Ferron said he parked his car in the grassy median of U.S. 98, the only piece of land nearby that seemed high enough to stay dry. He described seeing two cars ‘floating around’ in the water as the road became ‘a lake with waves’.
After returning, Ferron discovered that water had infiltrated his home to a depth of at least six inches. He had to throw away, among other things, a sofa and a coffee table.
“If it works, I’ll have to remove all the drywall and insulation,” he said. “Carpet. I didn’t have hardwood floors there, just the vinyl part. The wood underneath now needs to be replaced. So it’s all a loss.”
Ferron, who has lived in Pine Lake for a decade, said there was no way to insure his mobile home, built in 1986. He was scheduled to meet with a FEMA representative later Wednesday.
“If they made an offer for a newer unit that could withstand that (a hurricane), I’d be fine with that,” he said, “but I wouldn’t mind leaving this part of Lakeland because I I’m just afraid it’s going to happen again.”
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Ferron talked about going to the hills – he meant Zephyrhills, about twenty miles away, where some friends live.
“This really shouldn’t be rebuilt,” Ferron said. ‘Some people would like to lynch me for saying this, but there really needs to be a balance of the money we spend on reconstruction. I would rather see it be about moving people, or providing some kind of assistance for replacement that meets the standards, meets the codes. I’m surprised this even did so well.”
The owner of Pine Lake could not be reached for comment.
Some residents are leaving
Ferron counted several Pine Lake residents who decided to leave permanently after their homes flooded. One of them, George Wiltshire, told a Ledger reporter last week that he was leaving to live with family in Kansas. Wiltshire’s unit in A Street was deserted on Wednesday afternoon.
Nearby, a crew with a box truck, track loader and chainsaws were working to remove fallen trees that had clogged the ditch that bisects the park.
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Elsewhere on A Street, James Levesque and two friends loaded discarded appliances into the bed of a pickup truck. Levesque, who has lived in Pine Lake for three years, cataloged the collection: a washer, a dryer, two refrigerators and a freezer.
Levesque pointed to mobile homes along the street and described the fate of the residents.
“The one next to (Wiltshire) – not the blue trailer, but the one on the other side – they lost everything, including the car you see there, everything,” he said. “The water was up to the roof of their car.”
Another neighbor also lost all her belongings after water entered her home to a depth of 18 inches, he said.
Levesque, 38, said he was lucky. The water covered his porch but remained about an inch away from entering his mobile home.
“We were here with (Hurricane) Ian (in 2022),” Levesque said. “A tree branch fell on our house. We didn’t even get a tree branch attached to our house this year, but this is the worst. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
Gary White can be reached at gary.white@theledger.com or 863-802-7518. Follow on X @garywhite13.
