Dillard University student returning home to tornado devastation

NEW ORLEANS (WVUE) - A Dillard University student from Rolling Fork, Miss., prepares to go home for the first time since a deadly tornado devastated the city last Friday.

Rolling Fork was all Markeyah Moore knew before starting nursing school in New Orleans. Now, the life she knew lays flattened by an EF-4 tornado.

As the death toll rose in the days after the twister touched down, Moore said her heart sank.

She said her mom works at the grocery store every Friday, except for when the twister hit. Her co-worker died in the storm.

“And that hurts to know, because that could have been my mom. That’s someone else’s mom,” Moore said. “The fact that we knew her, we know everyone in this town.”

The college junior wants to be home to help, but she juggles her campus job, cheer practices and nursing clinicals.

“They’re begging for help from nurses, from medical professionals, to help them,” said Moore. “It hurts that I’m four hours away and I can’t help them.”

She said she can’t make sense of the storm’s path.

“It skipped my house. It just threw down a tree at my house,” Moore said. “Next thing you know, it goes right across the street from my high school and then all the way down from there is nothing. It tore down everything.

She thinks of how things could have been much worse for her family.

“That was God’s protection because it could have been us,” she said. “That could have been my home.”

Still, the storm that took her hometown away has given her a gift of perspective.

“I was going to find a job in a big city or something like that,” Moore said. “Now, the only thing on my mind is getting my degree and going back home to help those in need.”

She’s been blown away by the support of her classmates, many of whom she’s never met before.

Dillard’s Lawless Chapel is a drop-off site for donations that Moore will take back to her neighbors over the weekend. Donations of non-perishable food, clothing and shoes are being accepted at the location through Friday.

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