Locals 'Adopt' Grateful Joplin Families But More Help Still Needed

CWA Tot Survives in Bathtub: ‘The Monster Came and Broke Everything’

CWA Local 6502 President Mary Ann Hopkins with Joplin tornado victims her members are helping, Sabrina Hayes and son, Hunter, 2. Locals are being encouraged to “Adopt a Family” to help CWA members who lost everything in the disaster.

Burrowed in a bathtub as the tornado shattered her apartment, Sabrina Hayes gripped her little boy and fiercely held onto a mattress that was the only thing separating them from the flying, crashing debris.

When it was finally over, neighbors dug them out and carried them to safety. Everything Hayes and 2 ½-year-old Hunter owned had been destroyed.

“Hunter, he talks really well, and how he describes it is, ‘We got in the bathtub and then it got dark. Then the train came and then the monster came and broke everything,’” says Hayes, a member of CWA Local 6313.

The “train” was the May 22 Joplin, Mo., tornado. Beneath Hunter’s bunk-bed mattress in the bathtub, his mother says it felt like a train was running right over them.

It still frightens her, the dangerously close call for her and Hunter. But their new “adopted family,” CWA Local 6502 across the border in Arkansas, is easing their recovery.

“I truly feel blessed as if I have all of you holding my hands and supporting us, giving me the strength to make it through all of this,” Hayes, 27, says in a thank-you letter.

The family’s now-condemned apartment where Sabrina Hayes and her son survived the storm in a bathtub with a mattress over the bodies.

Local 6502 was the first CWA local to sign up for Local 6313’s “Adopt a Family” project. The goal is to provide more than just immediate donations for uninsured members who lost their homes and belongings in the disaster.

“We’re hoping that locals will adopt families until at least the end of the year, enough time to get them back on their feet, get their kids back in school, get a new home set up,” Local 6313 President Kevin Kollmeyer said.

Like Hayes, most of the local’s 550 members work at an AT&T Mobility call center that was outside the tornado’s path. One member, Gina Bloxham, was killed in her home. Nearby, Local 6312 member Sharyl Nelson was killed as the tornado destroyed an AT&T Mobility store. Four other CWA members inside were battered but survived.

Kollmeyer has tallied more than 40 members of his local who lost everything. About 20 of them, mostly renters, had no insurance. At least a half-dozen locals have contacted him about adopting a family, but more help is needed.

Local 6502 President Mary Ann Hopkins said her 200 members have been eager to help. Immediately they began collecting cash donations that she and local Community Service Chair Ken Lancaster delivered to Hayes on Sunday, along with some toys for Hunter. Now local members are gathering household goods and will be back with a truck in a couple of weeks to help the family move to a mobile home.

“As devastating as this situation has been it has truly enlightened me and opened my eyes to the amazingly kind, generous, and caring hearts of so many people,” Hayes says in her letter to Local 6502.

How to Help

To learn how to ‘Adopt a Family,’ call Local 6313 President Kevin Kollmeyer at (417) 623-2541 or email him at cwalocal6313@att.net. To make donations that the local will distribute to members in need, mail to: CWA Local 6313 Disaster Relief Fund, P.O. Box 4053, Joplin, Mo., 64803.