For the first time in 26 years, Lester Joe and his family couldn’t spend Christmas Day in their house near the banks of the Koksilah River, on the Cowichan Tribes First Nation reserve southeast of Duncan.
On Dec. 20, during the powerful windstorm, a 200-foot cottonwood tree snapped about one-third of the way down, sending limbs crashing onto the roof and hurling pieces onto both sides of Joe’s Wil’seem Road house. About 80 per cent of the house has been destroyed and will have to be rebuilt.
“Everyone was really overwhelmed by the damage. I felt really bad, because we were still trying to get ready for Christmas and then this happened,” Joe said Friday. “I’ve been just stunned.”
Joe, 69, had left his home in the early afternoon when the wind started picking up. “I was standing looking out our bedroom window and I started seeing some trees falling over. I thought I better get out of the house, because we have a lot of cottonwood trees and they get really waterlogged and really brittle.”
Joe’s grandson Darian, 24, and his girlfriend stayed in the house, but Joe warned them to stay downstairs.
“Darian was still sleeping. Then he heard the big bang on the wall. He went to check it out and there was a big tree sitting in the middle of the hall upstairs,” said Joe. “They gave us a call to let us know a tree fell on the house, so we went back right away, but I didn’t know it was that bad before we got down there.”
The wind was still blowing hard when Joe went back to the house he shares with his wife, Dorothy, son Edward and 13-year-old granddaughter Talia.
The Cowichan Tribes stepped in and booked the family into two rooms at a motel. The family gathered some belongings from the four upstairs bedrooms and began trying to clean things up. The insurance agent hasn’t been able to send out the paperwork, Joe said, because he lives on Thetis Island and the ferry was down for three or four days, so he couldn’t make it to Duncan.
A contractor pulled the tree away and placed a tarp over the roof, but rain is still leaking into the house, causing water damage, said Joe. The bedding and bedroom furniture are damaged.
“The drywall in the ceiling fell through and there’s insulation all over the place,” said Joe. “It’s all wet up there.”
To make matters worse, despite the fact that Joe asked a neighbour to keep an eye on the vacant house, someone broke in and stole a new generator still in its box, presents that hadn’t been wrapped, gift cards and more than $300 in loose change the family raises each year for the Cowichan Powwow.
“You never think this would happen to you and it does,” said Joe, who will stay at the motel until Wednesday and try to find out more from the insurance company.
“My little family feels really hurt from what happened and especially someone breaking into the house and taking all that stuff. I’m trying to keep the family together and be the strong one for the family.”
Joe believes the Creator was watching over him last week.
“One of the branches fell right above my bedroom. If I was lying there, that branch would have hit me right on top of my head. I was lucky I decided to leave,” said Joe. “I’m really thankful no one else was hurt.”
The family wants to thank the people who have helped them, he said. Friends have set up a GoFundMe campaign to raise money for the family.
