Evacuation Update & What's Next For Us
Hey fam,
Thank you to everyone who has checked in on us via DMs and texts and calls, we really appreciate the love and support from our IRL & internet community and literally couldn’t have gotten through this without y’all.
This past Friday, August 27th, it became clear that Hurricane Ida was going to be a major storm affecting the New Orleans area, and we decided the most responsible thing to do would be to evacuate. We immediately started boarding up windows and packing our luggage while we figured out where we were going to go. It’s honestly kind of a blur, and all we really remember is screwing boards up against the back windows, shoving all of Fox’s food and medicine into a tote, and frantically checking the news for any updates on what the storm was going to do.
During all that madness, our friends PJ & Thomas offered we come stay at their home right outside of Chattanooga, and the next morning we were on the road at 4 am headed their way. The seven hour drive flew by, and by early afternoon we’d arrived at their front door ready to get settled in for what was going to be a very nerve wracking 24 hours of wait-and-see.
On Sunday morning we woke up to the news we’d feared the most, the hurricane had intensified to a strong category four storm with extremely high winds, and it had shifted east which meant a more direct hit on the New Orleans area. We texted everyone we knew who’d stayed, but due to the risk of getting stuck in traffic on the way out of town while the storm came ashore, it was too late for most of them to leave—so we just kind of had to twiddle our thumbs and watch the news and wait for updates.
We were luckily able to keep ourselves distracted with a visit to PJ & Thomas’s beautiful farm (pictured above) and by spending lots of time with their three kids, who we absolutely adore.
It’s been a few days of being here, making dinners, drinking wine, watching TV, and acting like one big family, and to be honest we couldn’t have asked for a more supportive or comfortable evacuation.
Here’s what we know:
All of our friends and family that stayed in the city are safe and accounted for.
While we haven’t had anyone do a detailed survey of our home, our neighbor informed us there appears to be no obvious damage.
The entire city of New Orleans is out of power, and all eight of the major transmission lines and one major tower were brought down by the wind, which is something that didn’t even happen during Hurricane Katrina. There have been varied accounts of when to expect power to return, with some reports saying it could be within a week, some saying three weeks, and others fearing it could be even longer. Because of the extremely hot weather in August (the heat index is 106 degrees today), we won’t be returning home until power has been restored. Even if we had a generator, we’ve seen neighbors and friends reporting that there is no available gasoline anywhere nearby as everyone with a generator has had to fuel up. So, as for now, we’re here in Tennessee.
And… that’s about all we know for now.
Right now it’s a waiting game to see if we can even get an estimate on power being restored, and until then we will continue to hang tight. Luckily our friends have been so accommodating and made us feel so comfortable here that we’re not itching to get back—while the city is out of power and most businesses are closed it’s best we stay out of the way of emergency workers and continue to support from afar via donations to mutual aid and relief groups, some of which I’ve listed below for you if you have the ability to help.
Thank you, again, to everyone who has checked in. We’ll continue to update here, and in our weekly newsletter, and on Instagram as we know more information.
xoxo
Beau & Matt
Relief Groups You Can Support
Many of these groups are grassroots on the ground organizations that are distributing funds directly to individuals in need. We prefer to donate money this way as it quickly and efficiently gets money directly to vulnerable communities without the administrative fees and long lead times had by larger organizations. While we understand it may feel a bit odd to be venmo-ing your money to an account that hardly has any online presence, the below have been vetted as credible organizations doing work in the New Orleans area right now.