Iowa still cleaning up a week later from terrifying derecho

CEDAR RAPIDS, IOWA – Andre Moren picked through the debris in his apartment Tuesday morning, hoping to find a few possessions.

A lot of things were missing. Including the walls and the roof.

"I'm from Chicago. I've been shot at," Moren said. "And I never felt like I was going down. This time, I did."

On Aug. 10, Moren shot video of the derecho that devastated 27 counties in eastern Iowa, knocking out all power in Cedar Rapids, the state's second-largest city, injuring more than 60 people and killing three.

Moren's video is chilling, recording the moment when straight-line wind gusts of up to 112 mph tore the roof and two walls from his second-story apartment as he and his cousin Dennis Muhammad huddled next to kitchen appliances for shelter.

Now, like so many residents of this metropolitan area of 130,000, he's trying to piece his life back together after the rare and violent storm, often called an "inland hurricane" — an event officials called the worst natural disaster in the city's history.

"I'm sleeping in my truck," said Moren, who works as a chef. "I have a new apartment, but there's no power."

Giant trucks rumble past, pulling trailers loaded with logs cut from the countless thousands of trees felled by the storm. Emergency services officials estimated that the city lost half its tree canopy in the 45 minutes or so it took the derecho to roll through.

The air is filled with the buzz of chain saws and the roar of tractors and backhoes. In some areas, residents have set up tables to help feed neighbors, who often have no food in their homes and no place to buy it.

In one southwest neighborhood, volunteers from the nonprofit Strength Group Iowa have been feeding "probably 300 people," said Austin Foster, the organization's executive director. "People have no electricity and no hot water. We're just out here doing the best we can."

On Tuesday, President Donald Trump touched down briefly in Cedar Rapids to get a briefing from federal, state and local officials. Trump issued a declaration making the area eligible for federal disaster aid.

"We're going to help you recover from the storm," Trump said. "And we'll get it done, and we'll all get it done together."

More than 1,000 homes in Cedar Rapids were destroyed by the storm, with another 4,000 severely damaged, O'Konek said.

A group of teachers from Prairie Point Middle School picked up debris Tuesday at the apartment complex where Moren lives. Their school doesn't serve that area; they simply wanted to help.

"There's so much still to do," said Valerie Marshall. "Every single one of us has damage to our homes."

Rachel Lynch, another teacher, is staying with relatives until she can get the power back on in her home and get the damage repaired from a tree that went through her roof.

"I don't know where I'm going to sleep. I don't know what my next meal is going to be," she said. "It really puts things in perspective."

She'd been visiting a grocery store, a client of her food-supply business. As she headed out the door, she saw a tree snap across the street, bringing down a power line on a house that burst into flames.

Scharf decided to skip lunch. She hustled to a walk-in cooler and huddled there with store employees for the next 90 minutes.

Scharf's home had a tree through the living room window and another through the roof. Her husband, with help from neighbors, got the trees cut away and covered the roof with blue tarps. Scharf, who is nearly seven months pregnant with her first child, has continued to live in her home, but without power.

"We are playing it by ear," she said, as friends have brought her meals.

In Keystone, a farming community of about 620 residents some 35 miles west of Cedar Rapids, grain-storage bins at the town's two elevators were destroyed. The giant metal bins, about 100 feet tall, were dented as if a giant hand had punched them.

"As soon as the storm ended, we started clearing trees," he said. "People, if they had a pickup and a chain, they started pulling trees." The town's power hasn't been restored yet, but the fire station is operating off a generator and offering free food to residents.

Along U.S. Hwy. 30, which roughly parallels the path of the storm, pieces of farm buildings were strewn across the landscape. Even more dramatic, however, were the endless vistas of corn flattened by the storm, the snapped stalks turning brown in the sun as they lay on the ground. Nearly 10 million acres of Iowa cropland has been damaged, according to officials.

As Iowans piece their lives back together, they can rally behind the words of a man who had the roof ripped off from over his head.

"I lost everything," Moren said. "But I'm still here. That's how I look at it."