Cold Case Files - I SURVIVED: I Didn't Know How Bad I Was Hurt

Episode Date: August 24, 2024

Amy is asked for a ride from a co-worker when he suddenly attacks her. After bringing her into a secluded park he sexually assaults her, beats her with a brach and leaves her for dead. Trish and Darre...ll ’s house is struck by an F4 tornado launching it into the air with them and their children still inside. After having to leave an immobilized Trish, Darrell and the kids are struck by golfball sized hail.  Progressive: Multitask right now. Quote your car insurance at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive. Viator: Download the Viator app now and use code VIATOR10 for 10% off your first booking in the app! Find the perfect travel experience for you! Do more with Viator. 

Transcript
Discussion (0)
Starting point is 00:00:00 Hi, I Survived listeners. I'm Marissa Pinson, and I want to thank you for joining me each week to hear incredible stories of survival and triumph from the people who experienced them. I'd also like to let you know I Survived is not only available where you're listening right now, but it's also available ad-free in the newly launched A&E Crime, I Survived, Cold Case Files, City Confidential, and American Justice, all included in one bundle without interruption from commercials. Binge these true crime classics ad-free for $4.99 a month or $39.99 a year, only on Apple Podcasts and Apple Plus. Just search for the A&E Crime and Investigation channel in Apple Podcasts or Apple Plus. And now onto this week's episode. This program contains subject matter that may be disturbing to some listeners. Listener discretion is advised.
Starting point is 00:00:53 His eyes were black. He just, it was almost like a possession. I could not believe how scary this person was. Real people. The tornado was moving so fast. A few short seconds after the house falls off the foundation, it kind of twists a little bit, and then just up in the air. Who faced death.
Starting point is 00:01:15 There's nothing to grab, nothing to stop you, nothing to brace you. The tornado threw our house about 400 yards. And lived to tell how. I think he got the most enjoyment out of making me accept the fact that he was going to kill me. That was the only time that he was happy. This is I Survived. It's March 2009 in New Haven, Connecticut.
Starting point is 00:01:45 Amy lives with her boyfriend and two stepchildren. I was working two jobs, one being a sort of cocktail waitress at a bar, restaurant in downtown New Haven. And I also worked at a salon as a receptionist. So just doing what most 25-year-olds do, working their butts off and making ends meet. I worked at the restaurant for about three years. I had made lots of friends there. You know, we had a very close group of people my age that all waited tables. There was a dishwasher. His name was Jose, who I worked with, I believe, for about two years. We were more on an acquaintance level. He stayed in the kitchen a lot, so we didn't really interact.
Starting point is 00:02:31 There was a huge language barrier because he spoke Spanish, but he was very nice. One night, Amy finishes her shift at 1.15 a.m. Jose was across the street from the parking lot where my car was parked, and I sort of just waved goodnight to him. And as I was pulling out, I realized that he had crossed the street and he was approaching my passenger window. He proceeded to tell me that he had had too many cervezas and if I could please give him a ride home.
Starting point is 00:03:03 I did not want to leave him stranded there at 1.30 in the morning in the street, maybe inebriated, so I felt like I had to help him out. We pulled out of the parking lot. He proceeded to sort of direct me with his hands. He kept apologizing. We eventually, after 45 minutes, got into this really nice suburban area with beautiful houses. And I'm thinking, there's no way he lives in one of these houses.
Starting point is 00:03:31 There's something going on. And that's when my body started to react, started to shake at that point. And I pulled over on one of these streets to try and tell him that he had to get out of the car. He looked at me and he grabbed the crotch of his jeans and asked how much. I was actually very angry because I really thought at that point that he thought that I would give sex for money and that I was a prostitute. And I was just thinking, this is crazy, are you serious? And I started yelling at him. I said, no, no, over and over again. He got so close to me that I jumped out of my car and I had a phone in my hand. I was about to dial 911 and he had run around the
Starting point is 00:04:20 front of the car and punched me in the face, took the phone out of my hand and smashed it on the ground. I fell down to the bottom by my back left tire. I remember seeing the blood spraying on the pavement. I think I might have lost consciousness for just a second and the next thing I knew I was being sworn at. I got pulled up by my hair and pushed into the back seat of my car. I was bleeding with him. I was saying no. I kept saying please. I was trying to calm him down. He just kept telling me to shut the F up and he pulled his pants down and proceeded to force me to give him oral sex. That went on for about 15 minutes, and he decided that whatever it was I was doing wasn't working, so he decided that he would actually rape me. He raped me for about a half an hour in the back of my car in different positions.
Starting point is 00:05:21 He was standing outside the car the whole time. There was a house right across the street. I could see the front door from my car while I was being raped. And I remember just thinking, I have to get to that house. He turns me over, so I'm sort of on my stomach, and he's standing outside the car raping me. And I remember that I have a disconnected cell phone between the console of my car. So I snuck it underneath a coat while he's raping me and I open it up and I dial 911. And I could vaguely hear somebody on the other line,
Starting point is 00:05:58 but I couldn't say anything because I didn't wanna get caught with the phone. I wanted somebody on the other end to know that there was somebody here and that I was hurt, and if possibly they could track me down with, you know, the phone. But I don't think that they were able to do that. I wasn't on the phone long enough. About three minutes later,
Starting point is 00:06:23 he took a moment where he sort of stepped back from me. And I took the chance and I slammed the car door shut and I jumped into the front seat. I still had this phone in my hand. And I realized at that point that he had taken my car keys. So he was on the front door, unlocking the door while I was slamming the lock shut. And we sort of did a cat-and-mouse game. He was pounding on the door. I was trying to dial 911, and he got the door open.
Starting point is 00:06:54 So what I did was I dialed 911, and I slammed the driver's door into his body and ran past him to try to get to this front door that was about 50 feet away, screaming as loud as I possibly could. I remember hearing the dispatcher screaming back, where are you? And before I could answer, I got hit in the back of the head,
Starting point is 00:07:18 and the second phone got smashed on the ground. He dragged me back to the car, swearing at me, telling me to shut the F up again, calling me an effing bitch. Just so angry. Amy's assailant shoved her into the car and began to drive. He loosened his grip on my hair enough so I was able to sort of squirm away. So I could kind of look out the window to see if I knew where I was. And I noticed that there was a car coming in the other direction, waiting at a stop sign to turn. And I threw myself out of the car. He grabbed me by my hair as I was doing so, and I slid,
Starting point is 00:08:03 and my pants were down, and I was kicking and screaming as I was sliding out of the car. The car just kept going. I know that they saw me, but they kept going. And I thought, how is this possible? I just threw myself out of a car, and these people just drove right by. He got me out of the car and dragged me through what was a field. And I was protesting and trying to ask him, you know, please don't do this. I'm sorry.
Starting point is 00:08:35 I was apologizing to him, trying to calm him down. And then I started asking him if he was going to kill me. He just said, shut the F up, over and over. And he got me, he dragged me down through this field into the woods. And we stopped at, there was sort of a little embankment clearing. And he stopped there, made me sit down and made me strip and take off the rest of my clothes. He was swearing at me. He took off his clothes.
Starting point is 00:09:13 And I was raped repeatedly in those woods. I was pushed up against a tree. I was forced to give him more oral sex. Just really degrading, awful things. I thought about my family. I thought about whether or not they were up, whether or not they knew that I was even missing at this point. I thought about my nieces, my nephews.
Starting point is 00:09:44 I thought about the person that would find my naked body in the woods in the morning. I thought about my mother having to come identify my body. He made me get on top of him, and I remember bleeding on him, seeing the drops of blood coming off of my face onto his chest. And it made him mad. He swiped it away, and I apologized that I was bleeding on him. off of my face onto his chest. And it made him mad. He swiped it away, and I apologized that I was bleeding on him. I got punched harder, and the punches were so hard
Starting point is 00:10:16 that my eyes would go white. I would have trouble breathing. And if I lost consciousness, he would just pull me back up by my hair and yell at me to wake up. He finally finished about three hours later in the woods at that point, and that's when I had hoped, okay, he had gotten what he wanted, maybe he'll let me go.
Starting point is 00:10:38 But I was wrong. After he decided that he was done raping me, he went to put his clothes back on, and as I reached for my clothes, he told me no. So I sat down, and I had my knees up to my chest, and he came up, and he sort of kneeled over me like you would speak to a child. And he started speaking to me in Spanish, and I had no idea what he was saying. He said, Morte. And he was drawing his finger across his neck and pointing up. He was going, Morte. And pointing up like this over and over
Starting point is 00:11:11 again. Morte, Morte. I was shaking. I was pleading. I said, please, anything. Do you want money? I won't tell anybody. Just please, you know, let me live. And he made a joke. He said, oh, you have money? And he put his hand out while I'm sitting here naked, like I had money right then. And I sort of just said, I tried to say, I can get you money. And he told me, shut the F up. And he drew his hand back in a fist.
Starting point is 00:11:39 And at that point, that's when the murder started. He made me accept the fact that he was going to kill me before he actually started to do so. He made me shake my head yes. That was the sickest part because he wanted me. I think he got the most enjoyment out of making me accept the fact that he was going to kill me. I was on the ground and he was standing above me holding my head.
Starting point is 00:12:06 I was being kicked. He had work boots on. I was being stomped on. He was stomping on my face. He was kicking me in the ribs. He would stand over me and punch me in the face. To try and block those punches, I rolled back onto my stomach and he crawled onto my back
Starting point is 00:12:26 and grabbed me by my hair and proceeded to twist my head back and forth, pulling it as far back as it would go, and I remember feeling the blood coming out of my mouth. I think he was trying to break my neck, but it didn't work, so he just dropped my face back on the ground. There was no human in him whatsoever. His eyes were black. He just, it was almost like a possession. I could not believe how scary this person was. And he picked up a huge branch, about four feet long, maybe three inches in diameter, and he started to beat me with the branch, hitting me in the head with it. I was still on my stomach. And at that point, he sexually assaulted me with the branch. He ran at me and got the branch as far in my body as possible
Starting point is 00:13:19 and proceeded to kick the end of the branch with the bottom of his foot over and over again until the force of his kicks broke the branch off inside my body. He picked up the other end, rolled me onto my back, and started to try to poke my eyes out with it. He was standing over me, slamming the branch down into my face, into my eyes, into my chest. And finally, I was just telling myself, let go, let go. I just didn't want to feel what he was doing to me anymore. Every hit, my eyes went white white my ears were ringing I kept feeling things and I just didn't want to feel it anymore
Starting point is 00:14:09 I stopped responding to anything he was doing to me and at that point he believed I was dead and I heard him drop the branch I heard him walking around I heard him zip up his pants and I heard him walk out of the woods and I just laid there.
Starting point is 00:14:27 I laid there for about 15 minutes on my stomach with my hands over my head, bleeding, so scared that he was going to come back and finish the job. Finally, I had to get up. I had to do something. I had to try to get help. I said, Amy, you're not dead yet. You've got to get out. When I got up, I realized that the branch was still inside my body, and I couldn't move. So I pulled the branch out, and I proceeded to walk out. My eyes were swollen shut, so I used my fingers to open them, literally open them to try to see anything. I couldn't see the path, but I could just sort of see light through the trees in the distance. And I got out and I got
Starting point is 00:15:14 to that field. And I was able at that point to see more light through the slits of my eyes and just sort of get down the hill and get to that house. And I knocked on the door over and over again. I was knocking and ringing the doorbell, and eventually a man opened the door. And the look on his face, it was like you saw something from a horror movie. I just kept saying, help, please help. And his wife came to the door. She locked the door and shut the lights off. The people had called 911 and the dispatcher was having them come and ask me questions. So I knew that at least 911 was on the way. When the paramedics came, I think the
Starting point is 00:15:59 shock started to set in. I kept asking over and over again if I was gonna die and I remember asking one of the paramedics to hold my hand because I just needed some contact. He held my hand the entire time, rode in the ambulance with me and even came into the hospital. They rushed me into surgery. I received around 100 stitches in my face. My both cheekbones were broken. My eye orbits were broken. My nose was broken. I had contusions in my lungs, multiple broken ribs,
Starting point is 00:16:42 and I was just basically bruised and cut from head to toe. Amy gave the police enough information to identify her attacker. He went home to bed and didn't shower. The police found him sleeping in his bed, a few hours later covered in my blood. The detective told me that he almost didn't think he had the right person because he was so calm and cool and collected. There was just no surprise or panic or remorse in his voice whatsoever. He was completely flatlined. They questioned him for about six hours before he finally admitted that he had tried to kill me. I ended up having to testify.
Starting point is 00:17:32 Took about two and a half hours of testimony. And he was sitting in that room staring at me the entire time. That was the first time I wasn't scared anymore. I looked him right in the eyes and I told my story and I exposed him for what he was. He's a monster. So I took some power back that day. Jose Angel Moreno Hernandez received a prison term of 80 years. In my heart, I know that he's done this before, that if I hadn't gotten out of those woods and gotten him arrested, that he would keep doing it.
Starting point is 00:18:10 Amy made an amazing recovery. I was really worried that I wasn't going to be able to have children. I wasn't sure how much damage, what the extent was. Thankfully, a few months later, after repeated exams, I can still have kids, so that was one thing that he didn't take away from me. I'm still with the man that I was during the attack, and he's been amazing.
Starting point is 00:18:38 We've done therapy together. It's been a really rocky road, but we got the help that we needed. We're back in a house. We have a family. I'm working again. I'm just really at peace three years later. I survived because I had already given him so much of myself that whole night that I wasn't going to let him take any more from me. I wasn't going to let him kill me and leave me in those woods. I survived because I had to make sure that he didn't do that to anybody else for the rest of his life. And I knew I had a story to tell. Now that school has started, we're trying to make the most of our weekends.
Starting point is 00:19:34 And this Saturday, we're heading out for some food and wine tasting nearby that I booked on Viator. Enjoying the weekend means no cooking, if I can help it. So I view trying some new local restaurants as an extra bonus. Plus, we might never have found these places if it wasn't for the packages offered on Viator. If you're looking for things to do on vacation or closer to home, Viator is a tool you can use to plan and book travel experiences around the world. Their app and website make it easy to explore 300,000 plus travel experiences so you can discover what's out there no matter where you're traveling and what you're interested in. Viator helps you plan the perfect travel experiences for you. There are real traveler reviews
Starting point is 00:20:07 to get insider information from people who've already been on the experiences you're considering and free cancellation to help you plan for the unexpected. Plus, Viator offers 24-7 customer service so you know you'll get support at any hour if things aren't going as planned. Download the Viator app now and use code VIATOR10 for 10% off
Starting point is 00:20:24 your first booking in the app. Find the perfect travel experiences for you. Do more with Viator. It's March 2012 in Henryville, Indiana. Daryl, Trish, and their three children live in rural Indiana. Where we're at really is in the country. We're surrounded by nothing but cornfields and hay fields. We have three kids, Caleb, who's 12, Colin is 10, and Mia is nine years old. They can run around and see things that you don't see in the city,
Starting point is 00:20:58 watch turkeys run around and deer. Neat, it's just neat. That day, it started off beautiful. The weather was great. And I watch the weather every morning. I always turn on the news when we're getting ready and getting the kids ready for school. We just turn the news on just to see what's going on in traffic and everything. And they kept saying how bad the storms were going to be. Whenever you hear severe storm, you're not really scared. The last tornado to go through southern Indiana, Louisville area was in 74. Trish and Darrell were both at work while their children were at school.
Starting point is 00:21:34 At work I'm looking at my phone, reading the Twitter feeds from all the local weathermen and they're listing off different warnings for different counties. The later it got in the day, more and more warnings were coming out. And I was just kind of following along with them, seeing where they started down in Alabama. They come up to Tennessee, and they were coming into Kentucky. Trish decided to go pick the children up from school. It's one of those mom feelings, and it's hard to describe.
Starting point is 00:22:04 You couldn't tell anyone unless they had a child. It's one of those mom feelings, and it's hard to describe. You couldn't tell anyone unless they had a child. I had to go pick up my kids from school. They always ride the bus to and from, and this time it was different. There was a different kind of calling that I had to get my babies. I turned the radio on to try to hear what was going to go on in the area. And the reporter said, if you have a bike helmet or anything to protect your head and you're in the Henryville area, this is the time to put it on. Daryl arrived soon after Trish, and the children got home.
Starting point is 00:22:39 Daryl walks in and turns on the news channel to see the weather. And they actually said 16 minutes in severe weather will hit Henryville. Trish started packing up the closet, getting pillows, blankets, cushions, everything. And none of it seemed like a bad idea. I mean, what if something does happen? We don't have a basement, so we would put the kids in, you know, the closet and cover them up several times. Colin is getting all his blankets and pillows,
Starting point is 00:23:13 and he comes through the hallways with a big baseball helmet on. And he just asked, is it okay if I wear this? Not thinking anything about it was like, sure, go ahead, come on, let's get in here. As a mom, I felt like I was suffocating them because they were all three in just this little corner of my closet with every blanket and pillow on them and not one time complaining. I went out the front door, went around the corner of the house, and when I looked up,
Starting point is 00:23:46 there was a funnel cloud. I run into the house, and I went out to the back window, and she come out, and, you know, what are you looking at? I walked over there beside him, and the tornado, which was an F4, was going across the horizon. Daryl said to me, we should just get some damage. Shouldn't get that close. As soon as he said that, it turned. And within seconds, it was in our backyard.
Starting point is 00:24:21 The tornado was moving so fast. It was so much closer. And I saw it break a whole tree off and the tree went flying up in the air and that's when I run in the closet and I shut the door and got on top of everybody and I said it's coming and my super dad thinking I'll just go in there and hold everybody down the storm might take my my roof, tear up the siding, break some windows, but I'll hold everybody down. As I felt all three of them grab my hands, I just told them as much of encouraging words as I could. I told them it was going to get dark, that the lights were going to go out. They were going to hear some loud noises, but that everything was going to get dark, that the lights were going to go out. They were going to hear some loud noises,
Starting point is 00:25:07 but that everything was going to be okay. Mommy and Daddy were here, and God's going to take care of us. The whole house was rumbling. I really don't remember hearing a whole lot. I think my brain was going a million miles a minute. I remember feeling the house rumble and shake. I do remember hearing the windows in the back of the house, the glass sound, shattering.
Starting point is 00:25:32 We feel the house fall off the foundation on the backside of the house. We felt it go a little, maybe a foot, being moved. And then all of of a sudden we were picked up. Kind of twist a little bit and then just up in the air. The pit of your stomach just drops taking your breath away. There is absolutely no control. And I'm still thinking hold everybody to the floor, hold everybody to the floor. And then the house rolled over and we all fell to the ceiling and I lost grip of everybody. I felt something hit me, something big.
Starting point is 00:26:18 I don't know what it was, if it was a refrigerator or something hit me in the chest and rolled kind of over my face. It hit me in the jaw. In the turmoil over my face. It hit me in a jaw. In the turmoil, Trish could not keep hold of the children's hands. The feeling of your kids' hands slipping from yours is the worst thing I could describe to anyone. There's nothing to grab, nothing to stop you, nothing to brace you. The tornado threw our house about 400 yards from where our foundation was. Next thing I know, the loudest crashing noise I could possibly describe to you.
Starting point is 00:26:56 We landed in our neighbor's field about 50 feet from his pond. There was this bright light from where the house had just opened up. There wasn't walls left. There wasn't furniture left. We were laying in toothpicks. I was laying there, not able to move from shoulders down. There was a feeling on my chest of not being able to breathe.
Starting point is 00:27:24 At that moment, you literally of not being able to breathe. At that moment, you literally think you're going to die. There's nothing that resembles my house at all. It's just toothpicks. I was on my knees. My ears were ringing. My eyes were full of water. I'm just looking around, talking to myself,
Starting point is 00:27:41 like, what in the world just happened? I look to my right, and I'm looking to my left, trying to find out where I'm just looking around, talking to myself, like, what in the world just happened? I look to my right, I'm looking to my left, trying to find out where I'm at. But of course, all the landscape is totally changed. Houses aren't there anymore. Trees aren't there anymore. And then I heard Trish yell out to me, not panicked or anything, but she was trying to find out where I was. Daryl came over and told me that everything had been destroyed from the tornado. And I asked him, where are the kids? He looked over and he said that he saw them.
Starting point is 00:28:17 I asked him, which ones? Who is it? And he said he saw all three. All my kids were laying face down just a few feet from each other, probably about 10 feet away from me, just looking at them not moving and kind of knowing what we just went through. It was the worst couple of seconds of my life. Caleb, the oldest, started to move and get up. He wasn't crying. Mia started to get up and she was crying a little bit but not still not hysterical which is amazing. Colin it took a couple extra seconds. He just laid there face down and then finally he started to move. The kids all, one by one, started coming over
Starting point is 00:29:05 and checking on Mom. Our oldest son, Caleb, came over, and he tried to do what he could. He tried to pick up things around me and, get up, Mom, come on. And I couldn't. I couldn't move. I didn't know if her back was broken, if she was paralyzed.
Starting point is 00:29:26 I had no idea. And she said she was in a lot of pain and couldn't move. And I didn't know how bad I was hurt. But I know I reached out to try and take something off her. And it was like, it wasn't really a pain, a whole lot of pressure in my body. And I couldn't. I just moved one blanket off of her and I couldn't do anything else. else she just looked at me and said you got to get him out of here get help you can send somebody else back I didn't want to leave with her there but I got
Starting point is 00:29:57 three little kids that need help too power lines were down and shattered glass lay everywhere there wasn't a discussion about it. There wasn't any normal marital argument. It was, you have to get the kids to safety. You have to get them out of here. To walk away from that, I'm not the type of guy who's going to walk away. I'm going to fix it. That's just what I do.
Starting point is 00:30:24 And this I couldn't fix. I Survived is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Let's face it, sometimes multitasking can be overwhelming, like when your favorite podcast is playing and the person next to you is talking and your car fan is blasting, all while you're trying to find the perfect parking spot. But then again, sometimes multitasking is easy, like quoting with Progressive Insurance. They do the hard work of comparing rates so you can find a great rate that works for you,
Starting point is 00:30:57 even if it's not with them. Give their nifty comparison tool a try and you might just find getting the rate and coverage you deserve is easy. All you need to do is visit Progressive's website to get a quote with all the coverage you want, like comprehensive and collision coverage or personal injury protection. Then you'll see Progressive's direct rate, and their tool will provide options from other companies, all lined up and ready to compare, so it's simple to choose the rate and coverages you like.
Starting point is 00:31:22 Press play on comparing auto rates. Quote at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company & Affiliates. Comparison rates not available in all states or situations. Prices vary based on how you buy. After an F4 tornado destroys their house, Daryl is taking the kids to safety. They discover Trish cannot move and are forced to leave her behind. It took all I had in me to stand up. But I stood up, told the kids, we got to go up to the neighbors.
Starting point is 00:32:00 That was the only option, the only place I could go. And it's probably 600 or 700 feet uphill in the wet grass to get there. The only injuries I knew I had at the time was my jaw. My teeth were messed up, and I couldn't breathe at all. So I knew a lung was punctured. And he said, I will come back. All the kids said goodbye. They knew they had to go.
Starting point is 00:32:29 And he left and took them up. I made it about halfway. It was a small tree still standing. And I just leaned on that tree. I had to catch whatever breath I could. As I looked up, I saw somebody walking by my neighbor's house. And I just raised up my arm and gave one little wave.
Starting point is 00:32:51 That's all I had in me, and that person saw me. And I'm running down to help. And that was a neighbor I had never met before. His name was Dale. And I just told him, I'll be okay. I can get them safe. But my wife is down there and she needs help. Dale just took off running.
Starting point is 00:33:16 I heard a voice not far away. It was rolling within feet. He leaned over and told me his name was Dale and that everything was going to be fine. He was going to be there with me. The pain, of course, was so severe from my pelvis and broken ribs and my punctured lung. But something knowing that he promised to get me out of there was so reassuring. When I turned around and I saw another tornado, it was forming the funnel.
Starting point is 00:33:49 It was rotating. It wasn't on the ground. It was 80 feet or maybe 100 feet off the ground, but it was bad looking. Up on the hill, Daryl and the three children were utterly exposed to the elements. Something hit me in the back of the head, like a hammer. And I'm looking around trying to figure out what just hit me.
Starting point is 00:34:11 And I can't register yet. Their softball-sized hail started to fall. For two or three seconds, I didn't even understand what was happening. And then as they started to bounce across the ground, I'm thinking, what are we going to do? I'm in the middle of a grassy field with three kids, can't make it to any shelter, and here comes this. All I could find on the ground was two pieces of drywall.
Starting point is 00:34:39 And we all huddled up, put all our heads together, and just crouched, kind of like you would learn in school for a tornado drill. Colin was trying to hold a piece of drywall down. huddled up, put all our heads together and just crouched, kind of like you would learn in school for a tornado drill. Colin was trying to hold a piece of drywall down. I had another piece of drywall, and Colin was saying to me, I can't hold it, I can't hold it,
Starting point is 00:34:53 because the wind was coming off that other tornado. It was probably 60, 70 mile an hour winds where we were, and it was sucking the drywall off of his hands. And I told him, you have to. You have to hold it. And he did. It got super cold, and the rain that started falling was terribly cold.
Starting point is 00:35:16 And so I got them up and said, we got to continue on. We got to get in the neighbor's house. Mia and Colin didn't want to go anymore. So I had to pick them up. I told Caleb, you got to walk, you got to follow me. And we went the rest of the way to the neighbors. Daryl and the children took cover in the remains of the neighbor's house. And as the neighbor had come in, he couldn't hardly recognize me. He said, Darryl? I said, yeah. And it's at that point where, finally, I
Starting point is 00:35:49 started to feel everything, all my injuries. And your mind started kind of telling you what had just happened to you. It was just a few moments after the hail had stopped. And I heard voices. There was about six people that had come down the hill that day to help get me out. Her rescuers secured Trish to a door and drove her to the nearest medical help. It was a very long trip to me, but I had one of the neighbors sitting beside me. Her name is Karen.
Starting point is 00:36:27 And the whole time, she was holding my hand, telling me that Darryl and the kids were fine. Darryl and the children were also taken to the hospital. Every time they took an x-ray, they found more broken bones. I had broke sternum, all 14 ribs connecting to the sternum, my collarbone, shoulder blade, my jaw on both sides of my face. I have a shattered pelvis, a broken back that has separated from my pelvic bone. I have a punctured lung, three broken ribs, and a broken toe. Caleb broke two vertebrae.
Starting point is 00:37:12 He had to wear what we call a turtle shell on the front and the back for two months. Mia, our youngest, she had a lacerated liver. Colin, who was wearing the baseball helmet, not a bruise or a scratch. He's perfect. And maybe putting that helmet on saved him and kept him from the one injury he would have got.
Starting point is 00:37:39 I'm currently walking with a cane. I have improved tremendously. Trisha's intuition and thought about picking up the kids from school turned out to be a wonderful one. The bus driver just barely made it back to the school. He was running back for shelter, and it picked that bus up and threw it across the parking lot. It knocked the body off the frame, and it was that bus up and threw it across the parking lot. It knocked the body off the frame and it was totaled. Darrell discovered later how high their house had flown. As it went probably 300 or 400 yards over into my neighbor's field,
Starting point is 00:38:14 it clipped one of their trees pretty high up on the tree. So I don't know how high it went. It could have been 30 feet in the air. I survived because we were surrounded by guardian angels that day. They protected us from hail and from winds and debris. You know that we had some extra support and help that day. We survived because God was there with us. Raiders of the Lost Ark, Titanic, or The Wolf of Wall Street. No matter your vibe, download the Pluto TV app to spend summer doing what you love,
Starting point is 00:39:07 watching endless movies. Tell me that's not the deal of the summer. Summer of Cinema on Pluto TV. Stream now. Pay never.

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.