Bound Brook Home Destroyed by Fire
By Megan LaBar
The flood that drove 1,000 people from their Bound Brook homes in April led to further tragedy for one first year RVCC student. Fire destroyed the home she shared with her sister and brother-in-law.
Kaitlyn Chattin, 20, said the family evacuated on April 15 at 1:30 a.m. She was able to take only a hair brush, hairspray and her toothbrush.
“There was water running down the street, so we didn’t have time to grab any stuff,” she said. “I only had the clothes I was wearing.”
Chattin stayed at a hotel that night. At 8 a.m., her brother-in-law Joe Poklikuha received a phone call from a neighbor who told him his house was on fire.
Chattin, her sister Charissa and Poklikhua immediately went to the neighborhood but were unable to get close enough to see if the burning house was theirs. “The roads were blocked off because of the flooding and we couldn’t see” she said.
Chattin called the police to get an exact address of the burning house. The address on the police report was from the opposite end of the street. “That end of the street was not on fire at all, so we knew the address was wrong” she said. She was only able to see “a ball of fire with the frame of a house beneath it,” and couldn’t tell whether the house was theirs.
The uncertainty was harrowing.
“We just kept watching the news hoping they would show the house from the air so we could know if it was ours” she said. About 3 p.m., they went to a cemetery on higher ground. The view was “gut wrenching,” she said. “We could see that three houses had burned down, there was nothing there.” One of the houses was Chattin’s.
“It was a horrible moment” she said. “We lost everything.”
Chattin is trying not to focus on all that she lost but “it’s hard when I break it down to individual items that meant so much to me and I can’t replace it.”
Happily, the outpouring of help and concern she received from friends, family and co-workers has been “overwhelming and comforting.” Two of Chattin’s RVCC professors called her to offer their support when they heard the news.
At press time, Chattin was staying with friends. How soon she would be able to find more permanent housing was unknown.
|
|
