'How could we not have been more prepared?' Dean Park residents face devastating flooding again

With floodwaters rising and hurricane warnings intensifying, Dean Park residents braced themselves Sept. 26, reliving the trauma of Hurricane Ian as they once again faced devastating damage to their homes and community.

After a trip to Greece, Artis Henderson returned home to another storm, which inundated her home with more than 2 feet of water, leaving significant damage in its wake.

When she returned to the area early that Thursday morning, Henderson recalled her mother, who lives on the beach, calling before 9 a.m. and urging her to come pick her up before conditions worsened.

"I brought her to my house in Dean Park," Henderson said, who has lived there since 2014. “Everybody kept saying the storm was nothing, that we were overreacting.”

Then came the flooding.

"We were just hanging out on our phones and then on a text thread a friend sent a photo of the street in front of my house,” she said.

She and her friend stood on my porch, watching water pouring in quickly.

What began as minor flooding quickly escalated. Within moments, water was rushing into the streets. Henderson and her family evacuated to a friend’s elevated home two streets away.

“By the time we got to my friend's house, it was hip-high,” Henderson said of the water level. “This woman in this big truck stopped and picked up my mom and gave her a ride.”

As she waded through the water with laundry baskets of belongings above her head, she said she couldn’t help but feel a sense of disbelief.

"It feels so stupid now. How could we not have been more prepared? The water came up so fast," she said. “Even as the water was rising, I was texting friends and everybody kept saying it's not going to get any higher.”

The rising water transformed the neighborhood overnight, Henderson explained.

“I think people went to bed; I don't know if anybody slept,” she said. “I kept waking up and looking out the window to see if the water had gone down. It was just so eerie to look.”

It was like a lake had formed around them, she described. What made it eerier were the market lights on timers stayed on, casting light over this huge expanse of water.

Henderson recounted how she ventured out in a kayak at 10 p.m., only to find the water reaching just below her windowsills.

During Hurricane Ian, she said the water that flooded her neighborhood was destructive, black and foul-smelling, coating homes in sludge. This time, Henderson said the rising water wasn’t as muddy and believed it came from Billy Creek across the street from her house.

“The next day, we were still trapped where I was staying,” she said. “It’s a strange sight in my neighborhood because you drive down and everybody's stuff is out in their yard – dishwashers and fridges and couches and mattresses.”

By 4:30 a.m. the next day, the floodwaters had receded enough for her to enter her house.

Inside her house, the destruction was overwhelming, she explained.

"My fridge was on the floor, everything’s wet, my books were everywhere. It was just like Ian."

She said she'd be surprised if someone didn't experience flooding in her neighborhood from the storm.

"It's like this big bowl, and it just filled up with water," she said.

Despite the extensive damage, Henderson and her neighbors are not new to flooding. After Hurricane Ian, Henderson undertook repairs herself, working tirelessly until February of this year to restore her home. However, this time she feels overwhelmed by the thought of starting over again.

After Hurricane Ian, she said she did all the demo, repairs and work herself.

“This time, I just can't do it,” she said.

Like many residents in the Dean Park neighborhood, Henderson saw an outpouring of community support.

“My neighborhood is amazing, and everyone is so tight and wonderful and helpful,” she said. “The thoughtfulness of people – it was astonishing.”

As soon as the floodwaters receded enough for people to reach her home, neighbors arrived in trucks, helping her salvage what little they could. Many of the people who came to help were strangers to Henderson. They mopped out her house, brought big fans to dry her house and even did her laundry.

"It's just an incredible amount of work that feels unsatisfying because I just get up every morning and go there and put on my gloves, and I'm not really sure what I'm doing,” she said.

Looking ahead, she expressed uncertainty about future storms.

"What could we have done? I'm not really sure," she said. "We did move our cars to a safe location, and that was smart," Henderson said.

"The trouble with water and flooding is just there’s little that can be done,” Henderson added. “Everything floats, so there's no putting things on higher ground. I guess the answer is to evacuate, but it just feels like there's so many storms that if you evacuate for every one, you’ll spend your whole life evacuating.”

This article originally appeared on Fort Myers News-Press: 'How could we not have been more prepared?' Dean Park residents face devastating flooding again