How Sandy Hit Rockaway


  • Photographer
    Kisha Bari
  • Prize
    Honorable Mention
  • Company/Studios
    Kisha Bari Photography
  • Date of Photograph
    October 2012 - April 2013

On October 29th, 2012, Hurricane Sandy devastated coastal communities in New Jersey and New York. In the last six months since the hurricane, I have met with many residents of The Rockaways in Queens, NY and have documented their stories as they have evolved and changed with issues that are even still arising as a result of this disaster. This is a small selection of portraits from this ongoing project, which can be viewed in full at www.howsandyhitrockaway.tumblr.com.

Story

#1
Week 1
Gerald Silvester shows me the water mark on his house on Beach 36th st. He’s glad he evacuated with his family as the water level came above the height of his two children. Gerald and his wife came home to find over a foot of sand inside and everything they owned had been destroyed.

#2
Week 5
A lifelong resident, Tommy Booth is a superintendent at a high rise in Far Rockaway. His house on Beach 25th st, was flooded with seawater.
Tommy has had to throw away most of his furniture and the majority of his tools that he relies on to do his job. Nothing is covered by any of his insurance nor is he eligible for a FEMA claim.

#3
Week 12
The Smell of mould is overwhelming in the public housing block at 54-22 Beach Channel Drive.
Rob lives on the ground floor where the water came up after filling the basement. He and his roommates need to continually scrub the mould away as it resurfaces every 4 to 5 days. The tap water is brown and contaminated.
NYCHA has been promising to move hundreds of ground floor residents since the start of December. No one has been moved.

#4
Week 14
74 year old Hazel Beckett lives alone on Beach 69th st. A retired nurse from Jamaica, she spent the night of Hurricane Sandy with her brother who lives on higher ground. “The place was all topsy-turvy!” she explains upon arriving home to find her basement apartment completely underwater. In the weeks without heat, Hazel would put red bricks on her stove on a low flame to create radiant heat to warm her house. Hazel is still waiting for her mouldy wood flooring to be removed.

#5
Week 20
Beverley Penn and her husband have been living in the Garden Inn Suites Hotel in Jamaica, Queens for three months now.

Beverley’s journey to find a new home and get life back together for her family has been a maze of frustrating phone calls and paperwork. She constantly carries a pile of paperwork, so that she has all the documents she needs for any meeting for any different aid organisation and caseworker. It has become a full time job.

Finally Beverley is moving into a new home of her own. However, she says that it will never be the same. Everything in it will be brand new.
With tears streaming down her face, she explains, “There are no memories. No photographs of my family. No things from our history in there. That’s the saddest part of all.”


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