On the night of December 10, 2021, Hilda Miller wasn’t at her quaint home on the outskirts of Dawson Springs.
Her two teenage grandsons — Dylan and Richard Beshear — had gone to stay at an aunt’s house, while Miller had taken another grandson by marriage to the emergency room at Caldwell County Hospital for a potential heart attack.
She knew weather complications were imminent, but like everyone else that night, she believed it would be nothing but a tough storm.
Observing COVID-19 protocols, Miller was waiting in the parking lot when the EF4 twister roared dangerously near her vicinity.
In a state of shock, Miller knew she had to get back to Hopkins County sooner rather than later. Especially with her daughter in the car.
Thankful to be alive, Miller navigated downed power lines, took the bypass and arrived to what she called “chaos.”
Her home, where she and her two grandsons lived, was gone. Wiped clean along with 60% of Dawson Springs.
In the following days, that wouldn’t be her only struggle.
Over the next six weeks, Miller and her two grandsons stayed in opposite comfortable situations — separate physically, but never emotionally.
On Friday morning at the Pennyrile Forest State Park, she was one of 10 families to receive a brand-new camper courtesy of the Kentucky General Assembly and its $15 million purchase of expedited FEMA housing.
An electric fireplace roared and radiated warm, comforting heat. Her two grandsons, back together with their grandmother, slept comfortably in the back of the camper. Her daughter-in-law was helping arrange a small living room and kitchenette.
Like so many across west Kentucky, Miller needed this place.
And it’s faith, she said, that’s kept her together.
More new trailers are expected in west Kentucky by next week.
