Bouts of terrible weather have been tearing across the country recently. The South has been experiencing many tornadoes each day. New mother, Amanda Stockfelt, was one of the unfortunate citizens who were affected by one of the recent storms.
On Tuesday, January 7, a tornado tore through New Orleans, Louisiana.
It was the same day Stockfelt had planned to bring her newborn daughter, Autumn, to see the doctor.
Stockfelt’s plan had been to bring 8-week-old Autumn with her to work – near NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility – for a half-day before then taking her daughter to the doctor in the afternoon. Autumn wouldn’t have been with her mother at work otherwise.
The morning passed as usual. But then Stockfelt heard it: an incoming tornado.
“I heard the sound of a freight train and I was holding her,” Stockfelt recalled. She knew she didn’t have long until the tornado actually hit.
“All I could think of was putting her back in her car seat. So I put her in the car seat, buckled her up, and put her underneath my work desk. I crawled underneath there with her and locked my arm around the handle of her car seat,” Stockfelt explained.
She remembered huddling under her desk with her daughter and another coworker. Just moments later, the storm hit.
“We heard the trailer coming apart and then we flipped over backwards and then it's like the trailer exploded and me and the baby went flying through the air,” Stockfelt described. “I saw the sky, the inside of the vortex, I saw her and her car seat above my head…”
It was in that moment, when Stockfelt knew she and her daughter were flying through the air, that Stockfelt knew she couldn’t let go of her daughter.
“Don’t let go, just don't let go, that's all I could think about was don't let go. I couldn't think of anything else because I knew if I let go I wouldn't be able to find her and I didn't know if she was dead, I didn't know if she was home, I didn't care about me, I didn’t even feel my injuries until hours later. I was just worried about her, that's it,” Stockleft remembered telling herself.
Just as quickly as it had happened, Stockfelt and her daughter slammed back into the ground.
Miraculously, both Stockfelt and her daughter were safe and in one piece. In a live video on Facebook just minutes after the tornado had passed, Stockfelt can be seen jabbering about a car, clearly shaken from the incident.
Now, a couple days afterward, the new mother has nothing but gratitude for Graco, the company that made the car seat that saved Autumn’s life.
“I have to say shout out to Graco. Graco makes the best car seats in the world because without her being in that car seat, I don't know what would've happened to her,” Stockfelt said.
But at the same time, Stockfelt is now feeling the shock settle in. “It's just inconceivable. I couldn't imagine, I mean, I'm thinking my job's gone, the only car we had is gone, but she was OK, I was OK, and everything else can be replaced.”
We hope Stockfelt and her newborn daughter will be able to resettle their lives soon.
You can watch a full news clip of them here:
