Sophomore Soleil Cavallo did not want to see her house. 

It had been almost four days since she was lying in bed when a tree fell onto her home, crashing into the bedroom next to hers as Hurricane Beryl swirled around Kingwood on July 8. 

When her parents and older brother Luke made plans to go watch the tree get removed on July 11, Soleil wanted a distraction. She wanted to help others. She went to clean up debris at Trailwood pool where she is a lifeguard. 

While she helped clean up the community pool, her family went back to their home in the North Woodland Hills subdivision to watch as a tree removal company made a plan to lift the tree off their home. 

“I feel like watching doesn’t really help much,” Soleil Cavallo said. “It is sad to see.”

The Cavallos were like so many in Kingwood who expected the Category 1 storm to pass with little damage. However, Beryl carried with it sustained winds of 80 mph and caused mass destruction. Trees in the community called “The Livable Forest” started falling, crashing into homes, crushing cars and wiping out power. By Monday morning, the entire Kingwood community was completely powerless. 

The storm altered plans and lives for Kingwood Park students.

No one anticipated the magnitude of Hurricane Beryl

The night before the storm hit Soleil Cavallo was planning a trip to the mall with a friend for Monday. Her brother Luke was laughing about the hurricane’s name sounding silly. 

The storm was the heaviest in the morning, which left many families waking up to the sounds of trees falling and winds crashing.

“It kinda sounded like what I thought a tornado would sound like,” said junior Bryce Gerbasich, who lives in South Woodland Hills.

Gerbasich was woken around 6 a.m. when his dad wanted him to look at the fallen fence outside. The family lost five sections of their fence and two trees

“I think the scariest part was when me and my dad came to look at the fence, one of the trees came down right next to us while we were looking at it,” he said. 

Class of 2024 graduate Luke Cavallo woke up to the sound of a tree falling onto his home. 

“It was really crazy,” Luke Cavallo said. “I’m super close to it. So I could feel the entire house shaking. It felt like it was going maybe a foot back and forth. And you could hear things just snapping and breaking.”

He didn’t realize the magnitude of what had happened, however, and he tried to go back to sleep. His mom and dad rushed upstairs to get him and his sister to safety out in their garage. 

Trees, power lines could not withstand Beryl

As the storm started to calm, community members realized the damage caused by the Category 1 hurricane. 

Some families had trees blocking their driveways, fences blown away and branches completely covering streets. 

Senior Garrison Moritz walked into his backyard in the Forest Cove subdivision to see a snapped tree and a downed power line lying on the grass.

Sophomore Addison Blons and her family did not realize a tree had fallen from their neighbor’s yard onto their garage in the Bear Branch subdivision until the storm had calmed. 

Soon after families assessed the damage, the community began to rally together. 

Girls basketball coach Andrew Cross was driving around when he noticed the Gerbasich family trying to move their tree that was blocking the entire street in front of their house. Cross stopped and helped.

“It sped up the process a lot and made it way easier than it was going to be for my family to move it,” Gerbasich said.

The Kingwood area saw temperatures top 100 degrees in the days following the storm. The heat hit hard for the majority of Kingwood Park families who had no way to escape the heat as the community remained without power. 

“I have not been able to sleep the last few nights, but luckily my friend took me in with a generator, so I got to sleep last night, which was nice,” Blons said on July 11.

Recovery efforts spread across the city

The buzz of generators could be heard on a number of streets. Some residents had generators that cooled one room, allowing them to run fans and keep their refrigerators running. 

A select few, like Moritz, had full-home generators. His generator was installed only seven days before Hurricane Beryl hit. His family ordered the generator after the last rainstorm in May left him without power for a few days. School was not canceled during that time, so Moritz lived in his brother’s apartment and commuted until power returned.

With his family’s new generator, they repaid the favor his brother gave him two months ago. Moritz’s family took in his older brother and grandma so they could stay cool during the heatwave. 

“Looking back, it was a pretty good investment because now we have power for the past three days,” Moritz said on July 11. “And who knows how long the power outage will go.”

Many Kingwood Park students are still without power. Some have been told by CenterPoint Energy their power will not be restored until July 19. 

To help with the heat, local city council members Twila Carter and Fred Flickinger worked to create a cooling center and led efforts to distribute ice and water bottles. The Kingwood Community Center has been opened, providing snacks and water bottles. It also has air conditioning and WiFi. 

Carter worked with H-E-B to get snacks and water. While she was in the store earlier in the week, she noticed many adults and kids charging their phones at the entrance of H-E-B and throughout the already overcrowded aisles. 

Once she was able to open up the community center, she helped relocate all the community members from the nearby H-E-B to the center.

With this being just a Category 1 hurricane so early in hurricane season, Carter said the community was not as prepared as she wants it to be. She is already working on plans to help with Kingwood’s preparedness going forward.

Instead of scrambling to gather water and food for the community center, she wants it already stocked and ready for the next emergency.

“So one of my goals for the city is that we prepare these centers just the same as we encourage the citizens to do,” Carter said. “I feel blessed and fortunate to be standing here in a community that really does stand up, show up and support each other.”

With such mass destruction, the recovery will take a long time for families. Carter said she understands people are losing patience as power restoration remains slow. 

“Pack your patience, whether you’re sitting in a line at McDonald’s to get coffee, whether you’re in the grocery store, pack your patience,” Carter said. “Be kind to those who are working. Know that they may not have electricity either. Be patient with people, be kind, help your neighbors, check on your neighbors.”

The Cavallos are already aware that patience is key as they also try to maintain a little normalcy. The same day as the tree hit their home, the Cavallos took Luke to his college orientation at Texas State. They returned to manage the repairs on their home, which finally had the tree removed from it on July 12. 

The family secured the last available room at a local hotel, and are still unsure exactly what is ahead for them. 

“My little sister still has to go to school here just in like a month, so we definitely won’t be home yet,” Luke Cavallo said. “We might be able to move into a rent house. I’m not sure, but it’s really expensive. We have insurance, but it’s still just a long process.

“I’ve learned that things can change really fast. Like one night, you’re just laying in bed, and then the next night you’re not going to be home for months. Don’t take things for granted.”