As photos of damage at Rose Hill spread over social media, people came to the cemetery to check on their loved ones’ resting places.
"I was really concerned when I saw it on Facebook,” said Daniel Rivera. “When I first saw it I thought it was vandals.”
Sites for Rivera’s father and sister were undisturbed by the storm. Others around him weren’t as lucky.
“The ground was just collapsing, just collapsing all the way down, filling up with water,” said Rivera.”
Some at the cemetery hadn’t seen the posts, but were there at the request of relatives.
“My aunts called me,” said Jovina Lopez. “One from Ohio, out there traveling, and the other one from Robstown.”
Cemetery officials declined to be interviewed on camera; but they say crews are already hard at work filling in dirt, clearing trees and other debris, as well as resetting stones.
“The gentlemen that are out here are really working hard to rectify what’s going on out here,” said Lopez, who was at Rose Hill checking on her grandparents’ graves.
Both were fine, but she says she understands what people who found damage are going through.
“I know how they’re feeling because it happened to us with my mother at another cemetery, and we were very upset,” said Lopez. “But they fixed it and they fixed it right away.”
While they were among the lucky ones, neither Rivera nor Lopez say Rose Hill is to blame.
“We can’t control Mother Nature, but we can always clean up after her,” said Lopez.
Officials told KRIS 6 News there’s no timetable for repairs to finish. They say they won’t know until all the standing water is cleared.
