The recent floods have devastated the residents of Nebraska with wrecked houses and ruined terrain. The total damage from the floods has reached over one billion dollars as of now. The damages might be known to many, but the stories of hardships the victims are facing are scarce.

People who weren’t affected might not realize the situation that the rest of the state is in. One realization is that students of the school also had to face the floods head on knowing that their lives might turn for the worst. Senior Michael Kuhn is one of the victims that was told to evacuate his home and was forced to have to find a temporary place to live.

“Friday is when the Bellevue police department showed up at our door,” Kuhn said. “They knocked around twelve o’clock in the morning and were like ‘hey in the next couple hours or the next couple days you may get us knocking on your door again telling you to evacuate from Green Acres.’ Literally two hours later the last levee broke and they had a full armored rescue truck driving around the park.”

An estimated 2000 homes have been damaged which means that hundreds of people are left with dread knowing that they’ll have to overcome a great struggle that will last for some time.

“With us at first we didn’t know where to go,” Kuhn said. “There was really no good idea of what was gonna happen, but my buddy’s mom Erin, who is the homeowner, is allowed by her mother to go to her house in Carter lake. We’ve been living there ever since.”

The flood has brought many tragedies and has also made new word resurface from Kuhn’s past. With the possibility of having lost items that bring up memories of his step dad, Kuhn hopes that they are in safe condition from the flood that has brought a great misfortune.

“There’s a lot of photographs and stuff that I got cause recently my step dad had committed suicide,” Kuhn said. “I had to move all that stuff over and some of the stuff was his items and stuff like that. They’re items that I lost. I’m still hoping to get photos that were in zip lock bags of the old house and stuff like that and photos between me and him.”

With the help of money that comes from fundraisers across the state and the school, victims like Kuhn can feel support and hope from the donations that come from their fellow neighbors.

“It shows that Nebraska is strong, and we help each other out no matter what. It actually gives a sense of hope knowing that there Is people out there that actually care about people who go through tough times,” Kuhn said.