A category 5 hurricane named Patricia, brought with her 200 mile per hour winds, and heavy rainfall. This hurricane is now known as the most intense tropical hurricane. It is the second hurricane to become a landfall hurricane, first over water and then moving over land, causing tremendous amounts of flooding.

Special services teacherMr. Braden was affected by this storm. His daughter was vacationing with a family in Puerto Vallarta, and the night before she was scheduled to leave, Patricia was upgraded to a category five hurricane, and was headed straight for her with fast wind, heavy rain, and flooding.

“We were very concerned, and as we continued to text back and forth it became scarier realizing that this very strong storm was headed right for her,” Braden said.

Airports were shut down, so the people in Puerto Vallarta were evacuated to Guadalajara by bus. This was very scary for multiple reasons.

“At 9:30 Friday evening she called to tell us that they were arriving by bus in Guadalajara.  At that point I felt she was probably pretty safe. I was very worried about her all day because I heard that the road from Puerto Vallarta to Guadalajara wasn’t safe due to drug cartels. She spent the day in Guadalajara and her and the family she was with were trying unsuccessfully to get a flight back to the states. Morgan finally just went on her own to the airport and was able to find a flight out Sunday morning at 6:30 a.m. She had two layovers, first in Monterrey, Mexico and then in Dallas. Her plane finally got into KCI about 9:30 Sunday night,” Braden said.

With hurricane Patricia being as strong as it was, there were only six fatalities, but there was tons of damage estimated to cost about 199.01 million dollars.

“Needless to say she was exhausted and my wife and I, and Morgan’s little sisters were glad to have her home safe,” Braden said.