Not everyone was a good neighbor in Sandy...Mother refused help, children found dead in storm..

[HipChick]

Police searching for two young brothers who were ripped from their mother's arms during Superstorm Sandy have found their bodies.

The remains of Brandon, two, and Connor Moore, four, were discovered only yards from where they went missing in Staten Island, New York.

The boys' mother Glenda Moore, 39, is said to have spent 12 hours screaming in the street after they were swept away, but residents would not help her look for them.
The boys were sucked away by floodwater after Mrs Moore's car stalled and became stuck just before 6pm on Monday near the 400-block of Fr. Capodanno Boulevard in South Beach.

Mrs Moore, a nurse, tried to hold on to them but was overpowered by the force of the storm.
After the boys disappeared, Mrs Moore knocked on a nearby door for help but was told: 'I don't know you. I'm not going to help you.'

Mrs Moore then tried another neighbor near her Staten Island home, but when she rang the bell they turned off the lights and refused to answer.

As the storm raged around her, the nurse took shelter in a doorstep, screaming and staring at the waters which had just snatched away her children.

Twelve hours later, at dawn when the weather calmed down, she found the strength to walk down the street and flag down a passing police car to raise the alarm.

Her cousin Nancy Jean, 41, fought back tears as she described the ordeal.

'I can’t believe the way she was treated by the people she went to for help,' she said.

'The first person she knocked on, she begged them and said: "Please call 911".

'They told her: "I don't know you" and closed the door. She tried another door but they turned the lights off.

‘I can’t imagine what she was thinking then. She sat down for 12 hours and was just screaming. She was out of it. When it got to morning she went and found a police car and told him what happened.’

A friend of the mother who lost two young sons to Superstorm Sandy today urged the public to 'keep them in your prayers, they're going to need it'.



http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2226332/Superstorm-Sandy-Mother-boys-swept-arms-left-screaming-street-12-hours.html

[PatSeg]

1. My god!

There are no words.

[Jennicut]

2. Terrible.

I have two little ones of my own. Can't imagine. Just can't understand why no one would help her.

[KeepItReal]

3. From the same ilk that refused to let Katrina victims walk across Miss. River bridge to safety

There's a special place in hell for people like that.

They wouldn't even call 9-1-1?!?

[panAmerican]

4. Heartless. I don't know why, but I knew when I clicked the link, the mother was black

smh

[snagglepuss]

26. But you do not know from the DM story the race of those who

ignored her. I suggest not jumping to conclusions. Several yeaRS ago there were photos of a Latino man who was stabbed while he tried to help someone in a Latino nieghborhood. Other Latinos just walked by while he lay in the street.

[Blue_Tires]

40. Sounds a little like the Kitty Genovese case

Especially if that Latino man lived in a neighborhood where no one ever "saw" anything

[snagglepuss]

45. It was worse because it people walked by him as he lay in the street.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/apr/26/new-york-stabbed-samaritan-dies

[WinkyDink]

52. Not the Kitty Genovese story.

[snagglepuss]

58. Not sure of your point.

[WinkyDink]

51. Say what you want, but I'm betting race is a factor.

[snagglepuss]

60. You are going to jump to a conclusion with no facts whatsoever. You sound

just like whoever didn't open the door.

[KittyWampus]

108. I once knocked on a door in the Bronx to ask for help & got nothing but a voice through the door

I'm white and it was a white/Italian neighborhood.

People in the Metro area are generally on guard to anyone.

[magical thyme]

5. I hope those vile people never sleep again

I cannot imagine how anybody could turn their back in that situation.

[SoCalMusicLover]

6. She Shouldn't Have Been Out In The First Place

While the actions of those who refused to help her are repulsive, the real question should be, why was she driving in a car, through deep water, during the high point of this massive storm?

If she wanted to go to her mother's house in Brooklyn, she should have left much earlier in the day, not during the worst part of the storm.

The people who shut the doors on her and ignored her pleas for help, are repugnant, but in reality, those young children were dead the moment the woman got out of the car with them in her arms.

[ananda]

7. Even though there was no hope for the kids..

.. I will never understand the heartless inhumanity of those neighbors.

It just defies any sense of decency.

My mom would have brought her into the house and gotten everyone
involved in helping her. My dad, though racist, would have helped too
as long as he was with my mom. With his new racist wife, I don't know.

[snagglepuss]

14. We don't know if race was involved. I remember a

story about a Latino good samaritian who was stabbed trying to help someone in a Latino nieghborhood and other Latinos just stepped over him

[harmonicon]

70. Yeah... or...

the story is bullshit ... or ... people are freaked out by a stranger pounding on their door asking to be let into their house.

This woman's children are dead. Who is to blame? I don't know. Maybe she is, and maybe no one is, but I know that possibly fictitious characters who had nothing to do with the children's death are not to blame.

[ellenfl]

22. paraphrasing someone from our past . . . she didn't know what she didn't know.

until you've been through a hurricane or two, you don't know what will happen. it's pretty heartless to blame her for making a decision for which she had no frame of reference for the rightness or wrongness of it. i've been through many hurricanes and i cannot say i would not have made the same mistake she did. that doesn't mean she should have been turned away when she pleaded for help. what were her neighbors afraid of, anyway?

[Darth_Kitten]

28. My God to this.

You serious?

[OldDem2012]

31. This area was under a mandatory evacuation order. No, they shouldn't have....

...been anywhere near that location.

[underseasurveyor]

53. "She should have left much earlier in the day".... Really?

She was a nurse so maybe, like numerous other EMS workers, she had been pulling extra long shifts preparing for a pending disaster.

Should'da, would'da, could'da won't ever make a difference in any given situation.

And your judgement that, "she shouldn't have been out in the first place" = an asinine statement!

[HiPointDem]

109. +1.

[SemperEadem]

67. really?

she may not have had any choice. She may have been getting away from a situation that was impending danger.

should haves don't count once it's been done. It's really easy to smugly say what should have been done while sitting on the other side of the country, high and dry. That shit was real, s0n--we got a taste of that storm down here in DC and it was bad enough.

[heaven05]

69. you

have no business judging this person's actions. She might have had circumstances you know nothing about. And IF race was involved in a negative manner, it would not surprise me at all given the melting, crock pot we all live in. Amerikkka the beautiful!

[drynberg]

91. So SoCal, would YOU want to read what you just wrote about YOU

You sound like you would have joined those not lifting a 911 finger. Plus you don't know why the mother was in the car at that time, as there may have been a very good reason, and further, this article ain't about the mom's decision, it's about the lack of caring of those around her. Really.

[Dorian Gray]

97. I'm glad you feel

comfortable judging and blaming her.

What a despicable human being you are.

[lindysalsagal]

8. They're just not going to get over this.

Horrible enough if it's something that happens when you're not around. But to watch your children drown in front of you.

There's no getting over that.

Horrible.

[Butterbean]

9. That is absolutely barbaric. I am nauseated.

[RagAss]

10. If there's a hell.....

you know the rest.

[Barack_America]

21. Yeah, pretty much. And hopefully they'll also experience a good bit of it...

...in their remaining days on this earth.

[snagglepuss]

11. That is beyond horrific. There is another story at DM about a woman whose

84 yr mom died in her arms. Both these cases happened on Staten Island where people were warned to evacuate. My heart goes out to both however had both these women heeded advice of weather experts these horrific preventable deaths wouldn't have happened. Their not heeding advice actually makes me angry becasue it is this attitude of blowing off science that has resulted in unabated climate change.

[SemperEadem]

94. were they ABLE to heed the advice is the question

should she have abandoned her 84 yr old mother?

One tends blow off science when one is not able to just summon what they need out of thin air.

[snagglepuss]

106. The women who lost her two sons was a nurse who owned

a car, the other woman also owned a car and her mom was mobile. Unlike the hundreds if not thousands in NOLA who had no means to evacuate, they had the meands but chose not to.

[SemperEadem]

111. yeah, a car that stalled--not much better than having no car

like I said... what was she supposed to do, abandon her elderly mother? Conjur up a magic carpet out of thin air? "beam me up, scotty"?

whatevs....

[snagglepuss]

112. They both had ample warning and the means to leave way before the storm hit.

[LisaL]

12. Most people aren't going to risk their life for a stranger.

Of course that doesn't explain why they wouldn't call 911 (assuming they didn't).

[BigDemVoter]

13. How Awful. . .

That poor, poor woman. One thing though-- if the people she asked for help would have risked their lives, I certainly can't blame them for not helping. That's the 1st thing one learns in emergency response: you MUST save yourself 1st and cannot risk your own life trying to save others, or you may lose it along with theirs.

On edit-- just re-read the original post--There's no excuse for not calling 9-1-1. Awful.

[panAmerican]

17. Calling 911 would have sufficed

It's true that people don't have to put themselves at risk for a stranger, but jeez, call for help if you can't or don't want to help.

[NotThisTime]

19. If that was indeed a mandatory evac. area then no police would have responded in the height of the

storm. I have a friend I haven't heard from since the storm, can't get a hold of him, I'm holding my breath and praying he just doesn't have power and/or transport otherwise I would have heard from him. He refused to evacuate.

[hedgehog]

25. Taking a look at the Evacuation zones and Google,

no one should have been in that area at that time.
http://project.wnyc.org/news-maps/hurricane-zones/hurricane-zones.html


I am very sorry the little boys are dead, but this story is odd. The subways closed at 7PM Sunday; the bridges all closed bt 6PM and 7PM that day.

[OldDem2012]

32. Excellent points. nt.

[snagglepuss]

23. Would 911 even responded if this happened in the midst of the storm?

[NotThisTime]

74. not in a mandatory evac. zone

[obamanut2012]

98. No, and they shouldn't have

[AtomicKitten]

15. Heartbreakingly tragic.

Shame on those people who turned their backs on this mother desperate for help.
I can't even fathom the mother's anguish. Her little boys were so young and helpless.

[Barack_America]

59. Somebody posted about it the other day and it's been haunting me ever since.

How these people could have done *nothing* when they knew the lives of children were at stake. Maybe nothing could be done, but how can you live with yourself not even having tried?

[atufal]

16. OK. I'm from Chicago and I don't believe it.

No one would even call 911? I don't believe it. People react very differently in natural disasters than they do in incidences involving other people or violence.

I believe it's possible. but I don't believe it yet.

I mean, why?

Very unclear what anyone could do about something as terrible as this but if floodwaters rip your children from your arms...

Dunno. Maybe I just don't want to believe.

But no one took her in? Called police? I'm going to need to hear more. And how in the hell did the Daily Mail find out?

[Mariana]

33. I have my doubts as well.

No story in the Daily Mail should be taken as gospel.

[WinkyDink]

47. Are you crazy? Check ALL the news stories.

[WinkyDink]

50. The UK Daily Mail finds out much. It's ONLY a MAJOR news vehicle.

[obamanut2012]

93. Me either

I think she is looking for someone to blame for the death of her children, other than herself.

It's also the Daily Mail.

[defacto7]

18. I don't understand

why anyone wouldn't take the risk or risk their life to help in that situation. I would. I have. It's the instinct of the best of humanity to care and take that chance.

On the subject of not calling 911, that number was swamped that evening. There are many who couldn't get through. So not calling 911 is not something anyone can claim. No one would know unless the people who "didn't" call admitted it.

[LisaL]

20. So you would jump into water and drown for a stranger?

Most likely there was no chance of saving those kids. So, how would you drowning help?

[eqfan592]

24. I have risked my life for a stranger, and would do so again.

That's not to say I'll take a foolish risk, as I have no desire to die whatsoever, but you can't expect me to believe that the only options available to these folks were to ignore the woman or die helping by doing something seriously risky.

[LisaL]

29. Well, in my experience, most people are nothing like you.

[SemperEadem]

95. must suck to live in your world, then...

that they wouldn't even call 911... what horrible people you must have to tolerate...

[SaveAmerica]

54. She asked them to call 911, it's easy if you try

[LisaL]

75. 911 might not show up in mandatory evacuation zones.

They usually say: if you don't leave, you are on your own.
So I am not sure that no one actually tried to call 911,

[defacto7]

76. a little too broad of a reply for me...

I would do what I could. If I took time to care, I might find out there was something I could do to help. If I knew I could do something to help and it was dangerous, yeah.. I would do what it takes. I wouldn't just say, "I don't know you" and shut the door. I wouldn't just turn off the light. Saving her kids may not have been possible either, no one knows. Help can be in many forms, but complacency is a disease.

As to you first statement, How would you know? And to your question, it assumes your statement is valid.

[Honeycombe8]

64. The reality was that nothing could be done, anyway.

911 wouldn't have been able to get there. The people in the area...how could they possibly look for lost children caught undertow in fast moving water in the middle of a hurricane? Impossible.

That doesn't make what they did or said any better, but it wouldn't have made any difference, in the end.

[NotThisTime]

73. No way, my friend and I were talking about that time, he had gone out in that area for a brief

moment to pull a tree off the drive (that makes no sense, middle of the storm), he came back in and we talked about not doing that again until the next day, he wholeheartedly agreed, he said the winds were something he'd never heard. No, he's a diehard liberal but he would not have taken another step out that door, he shouldn't have stayed, he should have left, that woman shouldn't have been there, her kids are gone and my friend is nowhere to be found, I'm just praying for good news.

[OldDem2012]

27. At the risk of being flamed for being heartless and cold, I have a question about this article....

The article states the two boys "...were sucked away by floodwater after Mrs Moore's car stalled and became stuck just before 6pm on Monday near the 400-block of Fr. Capodanno Boulevard in South Beach".

If you pull up this address on Google Maps, you will discover the 400-block of Fr. Capodanno Blvd. is a road cutting east to west through the South Beach area facing the Lower Bay. There are what appears to be condos on the north side of the road and a large parking lot on the south side between the road and the ocean. This area was being absolutely hammered by Sandy at 6:00 pm and got much worse very quickly.

It is absolutely tragic that she lost her two sons, but what in the world was she doing driving with her two sons along this road NEXT TO THE OCEAN when a mandatory evacuation order had been given earlier in the day?? Did they go down there simply because they thought it would be fun to watch the big waves coming in?

I meant to add that this is the Daily Mail, a media outlet in the UK known for sensationalizing stories and outright lying in some cases. They have been sued many times and have never won as far as I know.

[hedgehog]

36. From the New York Post -

"*EVACUATIONS: "Zone A" was ordered to be evacuated by 7 p.m. Sunday night. The zone includes Battery Park City, the Lower East Side, parts of Brooklyn (including Red Hook and Coney Island), the Rockaways in Queens, City Island and parts of the South Bronx and Staten Island."

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/hurricane_sandy_closures_5ePbnf7aCmlUHSOgnP6hGP

From the Daily News - Monday 6:12PM -

The Whitestone Bridge, Throggs Neck Bridge, Verrazano- Narrows Bridge, George Washington Bridge, Henry Hudson Bridge, Cross Bay Veterans Memorial Bridge will all close at 7 pm.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/holland-battery-tunnels-close-2-p-m-article-1.1194698#ixzz2B105zg7O

[slutticus]

57. 6pm was the brunt of it.

You can see here: at 6pm pretty much on the dot was the absolute worst part of the storm.

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2012/10/28/nyregion/nyt-webcam.html

[defacto7]

84. You could be right...

but it doesn't change the philosophy of the discussion. This kind of thing happens all the time.

[lindysalsagal]

30. I live an hour north of Staten Island, and I am in NYC all the time.

I would never stay anywhere in the boroughs with such a storm coming.

I would tell my hospital or doctor's office or whoever that they'll have to find someone else because my young children and I would be leaving the area.

Period.

Take the kids, get in the car hours ahead of time, and get out to anywhere else. Anywhere is better than staten island or the battery.

[ProfessionalLeftist]

34. I hope the schmucks who refused to help her see this...

...and have nightmares about it for the rest of their lives.

[ecstatic]

35. Another woman was burned to ashes while neighbors watched on

At first I was really upset and disappointed, but in trying to understand I've concluded that they must have been in extreme 0survivor mode and fearful that they would meet the same fate if they tried to help.

She just wanted pictures. In Richmond Hill, Queens, a power line the length of a block on 105th Avenue between 134th and 135th Streets snapped and crumpled to the ground. The frayed end of the line began sparking wildly.

The line was still sparking as Ms. Abraham walked down the driveway and into the rain-drenched street. She came into contact with one end of the snapped wire.

She caught fire.

A half-dozen or so witnesses watched in utter horror. They said her body burned for about a half-hour before the police and firefighters arrived.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/31/nyregion/hurricane-sandys-lethal-power-in-many-ways.html?pagewanted=2&_r=0

[hedgehog]

37. There was no way for them to help unless somehow they could have found some

non-conductive pole to push the wire away. In this case, the witnesses would only have become victims.

[PavePusher]

38. 1. What was she doing? ...and 2. How was anyone supposed to "help" her....

without proper equipment for handling live power lines?

[Honeycombe8]

65. True. There was no way for anyone to help in that situation. Even 911 responders. nt

[defacto7]

80. There are some things that are impossible.

They did the right thing by staying away. The woman was probably completely unconscious in a split second and dead within a few more. No one could have helped.

[JI7]

41. how were they supposed to help in this case ? it's not even a matter of giving your life

to save another since they couldn't have saved her.

[WinkyDink]

49. DID YOU EVEN READ THE OP? SHE BEGGED THE FIRST GUY TO CALL 911.

[JI7]

56. yes, now read the post i replied to which is a different case

[snagglepuss]

61. How do you they didn't? Furthermore I doubt that emergency responders would have

gone out in the middle of that storm.

[malaise]

42. I would not try to save someone who was connected to a live wire

She made a stupid decision. If the mother's story is correct (and that is not what I heard on Pix when the search started) then that was heartless.

[FSogol]

96. I would (the live wire thing)

You push the wire away from them using any nonconducting object like a rolled up newspaper. You could also attempt to move the wire by a thrown broom, a pushed chair, etc. Just don't physically touch the person or wire.

Not sure I completely believe the story.

[malaise]

103. I need to take first aid lessons on that

Then perhaps I'd try.

[KittyWampus]

110. You would push a DOWNED LIVE UTILITY WIRE away with a rolled up newspaper?

LOL!

[nadinbrzezinski]

44. No way to effect a rescue safely

[lynne]

39. This is heartbreaking. BUT, I don't feel you can blame the neighbors for not coming -

- out during the height of the storm to help. Anyone stepping out in that storm would be risking their own life and family and there was no way for 911 to assist in the dark as that storm raged.

I'm a mother and a grandmother and I can't imagine her pain but I don't blame neighbors for not coming to her aid. It's not their fault that the children died, it was already too late to save them when the water swept them away.

[WinkyDink]

48. She was asking them to call 911. HARDLY "coming out".

[Honeycombe8]

66. 911 couldn't respond or get to her. Not in any sort of reasonable time span, anyway, if at all.

I don't see how anyone could have changed the outcome. She certainly needed some comfort, though.

[lynne]

71. I would hope they would have called 911 -

- providing they had power or signal. But even that's not such an easy thing to do in the middle of a hurricane. And, had they called, not even 911 could help her in the middle of the storm.

[Lone_Star_Dem]

72. 911 wouldn't have responded at that time.

The bridges were going to be closing shortly, and the storm was raging. People had been told to evacuate at 4PM and they knew they had to be out by 7PM or they were stuck out there with no way to get off.

Not that I'm defending these people who didn't at least take her into their home. There was no way they could have helped her save her children, but they could, and should have taken her in. I'm just pointing out that there was no 911 service to come to her aid.

[defacto7]

83. Hindsight is 20/20

But you don't know. They didn't either.

Saying, "I don't know you" and shutting the door is the telling.

[nadinbrzezinski]

43. There are scads of psychological studies that explain this

I am not surprised, saddened yes, but not surprised.

[WinkyDink]

46. I'm calling it now: RACISM.

[Aerows]

55. I'm not going to say anything good about this incident

But you get a bit shellshocked when you are in conditions like this. I've been in them before, and I am likely more able to get a clue about what is going on in a major disaster. Someone that is first time? They are likely as hell to not know what in the shit is going on.

You never know how you are going to respond in a life or death situation, particularly if you have never been confronted with one.

[demhottie]

62. Doesn't surprise me at all

Staten Island has the filthiest racists in the world. This poor woman is Jamaican and probably had no idea about the history of Staten Island, but blacks with long term history in NY could have told her exactly the type of animals she was living next door to. She screamed in hysterics on the sidewalk for TWELVE hours and no one helped her.

Her relative described the kids as the most beautiful children ever- one with red hair and one with dirty blonde hair. I guess the family still doesn't get it. People from Staten Island wouldn't give a crap. N***** mom, n***** kids. Let me die. I am so sad for that family.

[smirkymonkey]

63. Staten Island is also overwhelmingly REPUBLICAN. That explains a lot.

They have wanted to secede from the greater Democratic NYC Metro Area for years. Also, they are noted for being extremely racist. Bastards!

[hrmjustin]

68. I live in Bay Ridge Brooklyn, which is on the other side of the bridge from SI. I do not go there...

... unless I have to visit my relatives or just driving through the borough. To be fair they are also ignored all the time by the city. They have good reason to want to leave the city. Northern SI is democratic, but once you go south of the SI expressway it is heavily GOP. But this story of the kids dying because neighbors would not help is so inhumane.
You are right! They are racist.

[LisaL]

79. Kids most likely drowned before anyone could try to help.

Realistically there was likely nothing anyone could do to save them.

[hrmjustin]

82. True! Very sad story.

[demhottie]

85. They could have at least TRIED

or just called 911. The problem is that they didn't try to help at all, or even open their doors to her.

[former-republican]

86. Of course but there was a lot they could have done

Bring her inside , at least attempt to dial 911 for her.
Put a blanket around her .

You don't leave her outside all night on a doorstep.
This type of behavior sickens me and shows how much of our humanity we have lost.

This would not have happened like that where I live in a small town.

no way

[BlueMan Votes]

77. I wonder if any of them were among the ones that were pleading for help on tv today...?

probably.

[former-republican]

78. That story would have went differently in the country.

City people

[susanna]

89. That's utterly offensive. You don't know jack about cities, and that's obvious. n/t

[ieoeja]

104. Yup. Country folk would have shot her.

Every few years we get a story of some paranoid homeowner out in the country killing a stranger for nothing more than knocking on their door.

I grew up on a farm. I was told we were better than city people. We were braver, tougher and harder working. We had more morals. And we didn't look down on people like those city people do (I hope you see the irony in that statement).

I went to college and spent a couple years in the suburbs where I heard the same thing. Only then it was about both city people and country people.

I have now spent over two decades in the city. And I can not recall even once hearing that kind of shit from these people.

City people. I find I like 'em.

[RagAss]

81. Cowards...these are the same assholes who seem to think they need to buy up bread and milk...

before every fucking storm in the northeast....How did that work out?

[Kaleva]

87. The children most likely died shortly after being ripped from their mother's arms.

The mother shouldn't have been driving in such conditions.

That being said, I don't think I would have hesitated to help search for them had I been asked. A 2 and a 4 year old are worth risking one's own life for even if the chance of finding them alive was extremely remote.

[bermudat]

88. Without even seeing her picture, I knew she was a woman of color

May her little angels rest in peace. What a horrific experience.

[Separation]

90. Just saw the asshole on CNN

They interviewed the guy whose house she was trying to get help from. Needless to say he was an uncaring asshole. He said he didn't see her but a man trying to get him to come out. Then after learning that the kids were dead he shrugged his shoulders and said she shouldn't have been out there in the 1st place. If there is a hell, he has a reservation.

[HipChick]

92. This is disgraceful...

[Butterbean]

102. OMFG. I hope karma kicks him when he's down, and I hope it's with a steel toed boot.

[.99center]

99. Here's the CNN Interview

of the guy who turned her away

[HipChick]

107. sad..

[mstinamotorcity2]

100. From what I can see.

this woman was a medical professional. A nurse. Most Emergency and Medical Professionals are usually the last to either get their families out or to meet up with their families. They are engaged in emergency preparations for the lives of others. She probably got terrified during the storm and felt as though she should take a chance and leave for safety. But as most people they do not calculate the darkness,the wind,the rain,the flash flooding,or the depth of ponding water. I have seen people right here where I live try and drive through standing water during a storm and need rescuing. And with that kind of flooding and the amount of constant rain she could have been in a massive sink hole. Seen it before. Parts of the road gets washed away under the water and the hole fills with water and you can't see it. Power lines down trees uprooted. If someone is caught in one of those storms I can't imagine leaving out of the house until its over unless its just filling up with water. And there is no choice but to hit the roof. I feel for any mother who loses her children in any circumstance, and hope for the day when we won't lose a single life during a severe storm . Thank you NOAA!!!!!!!!