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Subscribe to RSSThousands of photos have been taken of the destruction left in Sandy’s wake, but as people return home to pick up the pieces of their disrupted lives, it’s the family photos that remind residents of happier times.
Mike Segar / Reuters
Nancy Gardini holds wedding pictures of her parents and of her mother and her two grandmothers that she salvaged from the remains of her home, destroyed by Hurricane Sandy, on Fox Beach Avenue on the south side of Staten Island, New York City.
Mike Segar / Reuters
A photograph lays on the stoop of a home condemned after flooding from Hurricane Sandy in the Midland Beach neighborhood of Staten Island in New York City, Nov 13.
John Moore / Getty Images
Family photos lie in the debris of Michael Russo's flood damaged home on Nov. 1, in the Ocean Breeze area of the Staten Island borough of New York City.
Robert Nickelsberg / Getty Images
Rosalind Silletto displays 43-year old water logged photos of her aunt's wedding party removed from her basement on Nov. 6, in the New Dorp Beach neighborhood of the Staten Island borough of New York City.
Spencer Platt / Getty Images
A damaged family portrait is propped outside of a flooded home in the heavily damaged Rockaway neighborhood in the Queens borough of New York City.
Julio Cortez / AP
Photographs of Elliott Miller's wedding day and graduation lay on a snow covered bench on Nov. 8, in Point Pleasant, N.J.
David Friedman / NBC News
Kerilynn and Drew Allen clean flood ravaged items out of their Breezy Point, N.Y., home on on Nov. 2.
Tom Mihalek / Reuters
Family photographs are piled on a water-logged chair in the backyard of Dean Stavley 's home following the damage by Hurricane Sandy in Seaside Heights, N.J.
Mike Segar / Reuters
Photographs are seen jammed into a fence left by Hurricane Sandy on the south side of hard-hit Staten Island in New York City.
Lucas Jackson / Reuters
A woman weeps as she is overwhelmed by emotion after finding her family photographs inside of her heavily damaged home in the New Dorp Beach neighborhood of the Staten Island borough of New York City.
John Moore / Getty Images
Frank Burfeind displays a wedding photo salvaged from a flood-damaged home on Nov. 1, in the Ocean Breeze area of the Staten Island borough of New York City.
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Eric Thayer / Reuters
A snowstorm hits the Northeast as residents are still struggling to pick up the pieces after Superstorm Sandy.
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Having gone through Hurricane Katrina in Waveland, MS, I know what these poor people are going through. I am happy they were able to salvage their photos, I only wish I had been able to find any of mine since my house was gone and nothing to pick through. We did find other people's photos in the woods and such up to about a year after the storm. We brought them to collection bins at Walmart, where they were picked up by a group that scanned them and placed them on the internet for people to search through and download for free. Quite a few people found their photos this way. Maybe someone can check to see if anyone is offereing this free service to the folks in the Northeast.
Just this morning @ 2:15 am did I finish the nightly cleaning and drying the boxes of family photos and documents some dating back to 1870 that were flooded in my Dad' Brick N.J. home. When I saw the photo here of the woman weeping, I too broke down as I know. It is a huge, emotional task, one filled with joy in recovery, but also pain in probably half of them that were lost. After having to clean out and toss everything downstairs that was under 4' of water, this was the last thing I wanted to do. Now on to rebuilding a fourth generation family home. Sandy has been too much.
ken-1058449- I wish you the best in moving forward. No doubt this is a very trying time for you.I will keep you in my prayers.
People are never really prepared for the kind of devastation which events like Sandy bring into their lives. If only some steps could be taken to help them save some of these priceless treasures before hand. But most of us never do, because we think, it would never happen to us, so nothing is done. Yet it isn't that hard to simply take our photos down to a copy shop or scan them at home and have copies made. To keep on a disc or store safely in a bank vault or on-line with today's technology. So that if something happened like Katrina or Sandy, we could ensure such treasures could be spared.
My heart goes out to all those who have suffered so many losses from Sandy and these last storms. I know what it is like having to rebuild ones life from scratch. I pray those struggling now will find the strength and have the resources they need to return to a normal life as soon as possible.
I can not say this enough to anyone who will listen. Get yourself a decent fax-scanner-printer and scan in your old family photos. After theyre scanned put them on jump drives or disks. You can quickly evacuate with them. You can give a copy to family/friends living in a different geographical area to keep safe from disaster. There is NO reason with today's technology that you have to lose those treasured memories. Even children's artwork can be scanned in and saved. It may not be the original, but you'd get to keep it.
Scanning photos is a great idea - however it takes allot of time - so while you work on that.......
Put all your photos in a waterproof plastic or fireproof (if possible) box - leave enough room to throw the framed photos you have around the house in when and if the time comes.
If the time comes when you need to leave for an evacuation - you will always know where your photo's are stashed. If you have time take the framed ones and throw them in the box. Take the box with you in your car if you are not leaving on foot or in a boat. If you have to split with the emergency folks - then put the box in the safest place you can find.
A little bit of planning can help.
I wish for everyone in the Sandy impacted areas - to find some momento that is important to them so they can move on.
Everyone else - plan ahead - it can happen to you too.
Storing them in the "cloud" seems to me to be the way to go. Most of the photo services offer free photo storage. Scan them and upload them and then you don't have to worry about remembering to take them in an emergency.
I think everyone was warned.. this was predicted and announced to be a very bad storm. Next time, get out!! Take your possessions and your families with you. This was not announced any different than Katrina and there certainly are more intelligent people on Long Island than down in Louisiana, enough that many, MOST should have heeded the warnings! Living near water like that, anyone would or should have had enough sense to get out! As far as Fema, and all the other agencies, they should have ALL been prepared and on-site ready to go. As well, it still doesn't give anyone the right to stay on your property expecting to be rescued when the warnings were so Prevalent! You not only put yourselves in danger, but the emergency personnel as well when you opt to stay in a home, near the water, with a storm looming and little resources to rely on. NOW is the time to get prepared, get ready to leave, have a game plan, get organized NOW for the next storm -- because this is THE NEW NORMAL. If I were you, I'd move to a locatoin with no water around. I mean, that would be the smart thing to do now, wouldn't it?
While I have empathy and feel badly, Katrina victims used the same 'excuse'.. they never thought it would be so bad. Our Weather People are paid salaries for a reason, usually because they can pretty well predict what is coming. Now you know.. make your decisions to either stay or leave. Because next time, you may not survive. You have seen the response from the Government, piss poor... next time, you will have no excuses.