This is climate breakdown: ‘I heard on the scanner there’s a child in the water’ | Climate crisis

Tera works with people who have physical and mental disabilities and lives in the same rural municipality she grew up in: West Hants. When flash floods inundated Nova Scotia, she was working at a group home and raising her two boys, aged six and 11. Those floods would result in the death of her youngest son.

Before the floods, I was always with my boys. Always. I never got a sitter. I wasn’t dating. If I was off on a weekend, I never wanted to let the boys go. We would do all sorts of stuff together: watching movies, going to the park, or outside with the animals. They always wanted to go swimming or the splash pad. We would skip school and go to the skating rink, which I got in trouble for from the principal. If I didn’t get them out of the house, all I would hear was two kids, five years apart, tussling.

They had a strong bond with one another. Alex, my oldest son, would let Colton sleep with him and they would make forts. He’s younger at heart than Colton was. The age gap helped because Alex was like: “I don’t have to grow up so fast.” He’s still anti-girl, whereas Colton was like: “I’ll take all the girlfriends.” He was always a charmer. I would be brushing my hair and even if I looked like crap, he’d go: “Mommy, you’re still beautiful.” He was probably doing it to everybody else because he knew it was just buttering us all up.

Colton was our glue. I have a lot of pictures of the three of us and he’s in the middle. I have a picture of him standing shirtless in front of a little pile of wood. He was just a hard worker. His brother loved it because he got out of half the stuff that I asked him to do. Where his brother still doesn’t know what he wants to do, Colton knew what he wanted to do. He’s like: “I’m going to do 4-H and I want to do Scouts.” He was still too young to do most of those. He never got those chances.

I knew early on something wasn’t right. All day long, it had thundered. I love thunder and lightning storms, or I should say I loved them.

Colton loved it just about as much as I did. He and I used to listen to thunder and lightning on my phone, put it beside the bed, and we would fall asleep to it. It started around 10am. It’d be light, then it would be intense, and then it’d be light. I found it very strange.

Colton was in and out of the house that day. I had to sleep for a night shift. He was at an age where he could entertain himself and just pop in if he really needed something. His brother was around and capable of watching him. He just prides himself so much in being a big brother.

I didn’t sleep that day. I tried. If I did sleep, I slept maybe 30 minutes. The rain really started around 7pm when I came on shift.

It started raining so hard. I kept checking the radar and it kept saying it was going to end. It never stopped. You wouldn’t even have a break between thunder and lightning. You would see lightning and thunder at the exact same moments. I remember screaming in the middle of my yard the next morning: “Would it just stop fucking raining!?” So much happened in the middle. It was like doomsday. It was like doomsday. I can’t even grasp it to this day.

I touched base with Chris, Colton’s dad. He had just picked Colton up. I don’t know why but I begged him to spend the night at my house. I was like: “Please just turn around. Can you just please spend the night and watch Colton at my house?” I remember Chris saying to me a couple days later I should have just screamed at him. He was like: “No, I’m going to go to Brooklyn [in Nova Scotia].” I said: “Brooklyn’s fine. I know Colton wants to see Natalie.”

Natalie lives next door in the same duplex. He hadn’t seen her in about a month. She was a grade ahead of Colton. Natalie would tell her mom: “Colton’s my boyfriend.” I’m not 100% sure if Colton was really into that. But, for a little six-year-old, he loved saying he had a girlfriend.

Chris touched base with me a couple of times and was like: “We’re going to go to bed.” I was in the mind frame of: “OK, they’re sleeping, they’re fine.” I got my one client to sleep by 12.30am. I had been scrolling Facebook and seen they were calling for an emergency alert on the scanner.

I remember hearing: “I need that emergency alert. I needed it a half-hour ago.” My other client got up just as I heard there was massive flooding in Brooklyn. I was like: I’ll just take care of her and then I’ll call Chris. I wish I had called him then because it took me 15 minutes, and 15 minutes is what he says he would have needed.

I called him at 2.28am. He answered the phone. I think he said “shit”. He was touching water when he put his feet over the bed and got up. He went to the side door and flicked on the porch light. He watched the shed float by the door as I was on the phone with him. He was panicked. It was his voice. It was nothing but panic.

I told him, “Call 911,” and that I would try to call and wake up Natalie’s parents, Nick and Courtney. I did not reach anybody. I called my dad, told him Chris was in trouble, that Chris was going to try and get to his mother’s and call me. That was a call I never got.

After Chris got off the phone with me, he called 911. While he was on the phone with 911, the house started to crack like a tree coming down. It was the water pushing against the house. There was so much water his side door wouldn’t open. He debated if it was shallow enough to put the dog and Colton out the front window. He didn’t want to do that so he went back to the side door. The pressure had eased up enough that the door opened. As he was walking out to the driveway, dog in one hand and Colton in the other, his truck floated away.

When he got to the front of the house, Nick and Courtney were trying to open their door and they couldn’t because of the pressure inside. It took Chris pushing and Nick and Courtney pulling. They got the door open and that’s when Chris watched a tractor-trailer drive through and get taken where his truck had already got swept off into the water. Chris, Nick and Courtney made the decision to get into Nick’s Ford F-450. They put Natalie, Colton, Courtney and her two-year-old son, Christian, in the back seat. They had one dog and Chris’s dogs. They left a cat and a dog named Skye in the house because Skye was too scared. The water just kept rising.

I was dialling phone numbers, trying to get in relief staff. It’s almost like a dream when you’re trying to dial 911 and you can’t hit the numbers. Every number was like that. I couldn’t press the buttons into the phone without having to stop and try it again. I had gone back on to the scanner and I heard there was a family stuck on Highway 14 in Brooklyn along the dyke. I only knew one family there. I knew it was Chris, his neighbours and the kids.

I tried to call Chris and it just went to voicemail. I remember hearing on the scanner that there’s a child in the water. I was hoping I misheard. I walked outside, down the stairs, to check on the other part of the building because there were clients there as well. I was soaked. It was raining so hard. I stopped. I couldn’t move. I was frozen in more than one way. I have never been this cold in my life. I remember saying: “No, Colton. Please no. God, no.” I was pleading with the rain and lightning.

I eventually did move. I went next door and got a hold of another colleague. When she did arrive at 4.30am, I repeated to her: “Grace, he’s gone. He’s gone, Grace. He’s cold. He’s cold. I feel it. He’s cold.” I don’t remember much of that, but I guess I just said it over and over again. In the meantime, my dad called my mom, woke her up, had my uncle go out and get her. When she showed up, I was the same. At about 5am I made my way to Chris’s mother’s with my mom. I waited for the rain to stop. I waited for the thunder to stop. It never stopped.

Around 5.20am I got a call from Truro hospital. I was like: “You have to be fucking kidding me. That hospital’s not close. How am I going to get there?”

The nurse said: “Is this Tera?” I said: “Yes.” She goes: “I have good news. I have Chris here. He’s in shock. But he’s OK.” I remember saying: “That’s great, but what about Colton?” She had said: “Colton?” I went: “Yes, Colton, my son, he’s six.” She goes: “I don’t know. He’s not here. We don’t have him.”

I told my mom I had to go into town. I went to our community centre. The gentlemen said: “There’s just families here.” I was like: “My six-year-old’s missing. I just need to look.” I’ll never forget the whispering looks and faces of concern. He wasn’t there. I went to Windsor hospital. He wasn’t there.

Being desperate but not wanting to bug people trying to help other people, I made my way to the RCMP [Royal Canadian Mounted Police] station where I asked if anybody had found him. I needed to get to Chris. Even though Chris and I are divorced, he was the only one who knew what happened to my baby. He was the only one who knew what happened to our baby.

When my brother picked me up and we started making our way to Truro, we had to drive through Brooklyn. I remember seeing the road, not far around that bend where Chris lived, and it was barricaded. There were emergency vehicles, helicopters, cop cars and people wearing orange everywhere. I had taken Colton’s stuffed duck that he stole from me. It was a gift from a friend. I wouldn’t let go. I was crying. I put the seat reclined back so I didn’t see the water.

It was one hell of a drive. There were rocks on the road. There were roads we’d get to and we’d turn around. I remember putting up my seat knowing we were pretty much getting there and looking out the passenger window. There was a fair right in front of the hospital. There was a fucking fair. There was a ferris wheel. There were lights lit up. I just remember going: “Are you kidding me?” I didn’t want to see happiness.

We drove up to a drop-off spot just as Chris was being discharged. I remember hugging him and Natalie’s parents. We went to school together. I remember hugging everybody and crying. We just didn’t have our babies. We didn’t have our children. They didn’t have their little girl and I didn’t have my little boy. We didn’t know what to say. We were just four parents gutted. We get in the car. Chris and I are crying. That’s the first time I realized they didn’t flee in Chris’s truck. He goes: “It was gone.” It took a day for Chris to tell me other facts. I heard bits and pieces of it on the drive home.

The hardest thing for people to understand is that they had nowhere to go. There was no way to get on the roof of the house. They had no hills. They had no high spots. The house was in the middle of a river.

Their only option was the truck. They had to back up to turn around in the driveway, which cost them valuable time. The truck was getting hung up on the new pavement. The water kept rising. They went to turn left out of the driveway and that’s when the current on the left side of the house came so hard that it picked up the nose of the truck.

As it picked up the nose of the truck, somebody said roll down the windows. They cranked down the windows and they got sucked out of the truck. Nobody even had a chance to grab Colton and Natalie. The water gave them no option. Nick went out one window. Courtney and her two-year-old went out one window. And Chris went out the other. Chris was the last one holding on to the truck. It had gone sideways.

Chris had a hold of the window ledge with his foot. Chris lost hold of the truck and was swept away when he tried to throw himself down into the water to get the kids. I’d heard the emergency alert go off at 3.06am, Colton would have been dead almost half an hour.

It was a long drive back home into Windsor. I had friends show up to try and comfort me and Chris. I remember friends trying to make me eat. I remember my eyes hurting.

I think somebody gave me lorazepam. I went to sleep and I did not turn. I woke up around 6am and I thought I heard Colton tiptoeing into my room. I swore it was Colton tiptoeing into my room. He rarely missed sleeping with me. I realized, when I scooched back in my bed and threw the blanket back, he wasn’t there. That’s when I realized that it was real and everything that happened the night before came flooding back.

I got up, grabbed one of Colton’s stuffies, and walked outside. I sat on the front doorstep. Dump trucks started driving by and lining up around the corner. I was like: “What the fuck is going on?” I live on a dead-end road. I walked down and the end of my road was gone. It was gone. A tiny river we have had just taken a road and cut off six houses. At the end of their driveway was a 3ft drop or more. I remember standing there with his stuffy, seeing a neighbour, and the neighbour going: “I’m so sorry.” I walked home and realized my neighbours had taken my animals and taken care of them. I didn’t realize half my shed was ready to fall down.

I remember my chest was so tight. I couldn’t breathe. I was struggling to process “Colton’s not coming home”.

I remember calling our mental health crisis line. They called me back and went: “Well, our mental health crisis van can meet you at 11.30 but it does not go to rural municipalities. You have to drive to Sackville, maybe Mount Uniacke.” I didn’t want to drive 40 minutes to Sackville. I didn’t want to leave Hants County. All I could remember thinking was: “Why can’t you just come here?”

At this point, I hadn’t told Alex. His dad, Edward, and I had a brief conversation about taking his phone because his friends had Facebook and were starting to message him if Colton was OK. He was 3km away from where Colton died in Brooklyn. My dad went with me and I remember driving around the barricade again and seeing all the people searching. I got to Alex’s dad’s and went in. Alex looked at me and goes: “Something’s wrong.” I went: “Yes.”

I said: “All those helicopters you see and hear that are flying over above you …” He goes: “Yes.” I said: “They’re looking for your brother and they’re looking for Natalie.” I remember him looking at me and going: “Is there any chance they’re going to find him?” I said: “There is a chance, but the more time that goes on, the worse those chances get.” I couldn’t take the hope out of him. He was trying to be hopeful and I just couldn’t do it. He cried, but he cried with a blank look. His eyes just went dark. He wasn’t mad, he wasn’t sobbing. He just had these little tears and he was quiet.

I remember me and his dad hugging him together. We were close. Colton called Edward “Uncle Eddie”. I gave Alex the option to stay with me and he said: “I’m going to stay with Dad.” I said: “OK, I’m going to see how I can help your brother.”

Then and there was when I decided I was going to ground search and rescue. And that’s when I met the head of command, Jason Butler. Jason took me in and showed me where they were searching. He gave me the best update he could and offered to take me on site.

This beautiful field that I once drove by every day was a lake. It was so hot and sunny. I just saw little bits of the truck that the kids were in. The house had moved off its foundation, across the front lawn, and was stopped by a tree. It smelled of rot and feces. The tractor-trailer that went in was filled with processed chicken. Septic tanks had been exposed.

I chose to stay at ground search and rescue as much as I could. They told me, if you see people laughing, don’t take it to heart. If you see people having a nap, don’t take it to heart.” I wouldn’t have given it a second thought. It helped me to see them laughing because Colton was always down for a good joke. It didn’t take me long to start asking how they are doing.

I wanted them to know that I’m Colton’s mom. I am so thankful for you. I encouraged them to nap. I encourage them to rest. I learned to make jokes with them, smile with them, and tell them stories about Colton. I know some people made the comments that I needed to put myself first, but helping people was the best medicine I could have.

The next day, my parents showed up with all my family. I remember my uncle coming. He had lost his wife in May. I gave him the biggest hug. I was like: “I can’t help but think that aunt Marlene went because she knew. The only reason I think I’m going to be OK today is because she’s got Colton.” That day was the day they found Natalie. Some people had been searching a beach and found her. She was in the Minas Basin.

I remember going: “Oh God, what if he went out there? No, he has to be in the field.” I remember looking out and going: “He could be anywhere.”

There was so much mud on everything. The mud wasn’t just on the ground. The mud was 10, 15ft up in the air. That’s when it clued in they weren’t just going to walk upon a little boy in a red shirt. They’re going to come across a little boy covered in mud and he wouldn’t be seen right away.

Alex called and asked if he could stop in. He’s always soft hearted and super kind. I made sure he didn’t have to look and see how they were searching for Colton. But he was like: “I want to look.” He met Jason, looked at some of the stuff, and goes: “Mommy, I heard they found someone.” I went, “Yes, buddy, they did.” He goes: “Who’d they find.” I said: “Natalie.” He goes: “Mom, did she say anything about Colton?” I said: “No, she can’t.” That’s when he knew his brother was never coming home. He knew but he just said: “Oh.”

The next day, I got a call from the RCMP. They said: “We finally got the field drained completely. We’re going to search it this morning. Can you not come today just in case?” I said: “OK.” That morning, I had gone to the Superstore. I bought these carnations that weren’t even worth 50% off. They looked like the inside of a piece of salmon. But Colton had wanted to buy them for me before he died. I tried to go to the dollar store to buy these ugly earrings he also wanted me to buy that day. They weren’t there. So I ordered a pair off Amazon the same morning.

I remember Chris and I going to where Courtney and Nick were. I went out on the back deck and I got this strange message on my phone from a friend. She goes: “Where are you at?” I’m like: “Nick and Courtney’s grandmother’s.” I knew the RCMP were hunting me. I remember sitting in that rocking bench. I remember rocking back in it. I remember looking out on to the hill and there were windmills in the distance. I remember looking at the windmills. It wasn’t long before the RCMP showed up and asked for some privacy with us. I remember them sitting down and they said they conducted a search of the field. They found a body. They believed it was Colton and that Colton is dead. I’ve never felt such heartbreak and relief at the same time.

I remember getting upset with the coroner’s office because I didn’t want them to do an autopsy and they didn’t give me a choice.

I remember saying to them: “Fine, can I just identify the body?” They sent a picture through email to my brother because they didn’t think I could do it.

It would have been nice if I had somebody looking out for my interests and helping me advocate for what I want, even if I wasn’t totally right, instead of me just taking the word for it and going: “OK.” I made one request and that was for them to keep him as close to Natalie as possible because I didn’t want them separating again.

Natalie was convinced she was going to marry Colton. They liked lighting off fireworks. They liked fishing in the river. There’s a video of them making a water slide in the backyard. They needed to stay together. They had been beside each other when it happened. They were together and they went together.

From there, the days drag. We had a very small family viewing on Saturday. It was like hitting a wall when I rounded the corner and I just saw his little body in this little white casket. We had him put in his Spider-Man costume and put the carnations he wanted me to have put on his chest. I wanted him to have a piece of his blankie. I didn’t know what I expected when I put his blanket in his hand. I knew it was going to be stiff. But it still wasn’t what I expected.

After everybody left, the funeral director and I walked in holding Chris on either side. Chris cried really, really bad. Then, I went back in by myself, knelt down, put my head against the casket, and played with Colton’s hair. His blond hair. I rubbed his chest and talked to him. I closed my eyes. I don’t know if I was asleep. But, seeing him, it was the most peace I’d been in. I must have stayed there for an hour. I remember Chris and the funeral director checking in to see if I was sleeping. I kissed Colton goodbye.

I miss him so much. Working the way I was, I did not realize how much he was there for me. Alex will be like: “Mom, you need to go and have a nap.” But he was doing what he should be doing, which was hanging out with his friends. Colton wanted to be there for me as much as I was there for him. If I was sitting on the couch and looked tired, he’d be like: “I got a blanket, not just for me, but for you too, Mom.”

If he was eating something, he always made a point to share with me. If I didn’t feel like eating, he’d always be like: “Oh, here’s a snack, Mom, I got one for you too.” Colton took care of me. It sounds weird to say it out loud. I’m sure some people don’t realize that until they sit there and think about their own situation and be like: “Whoa.” Colton was the main person taking care of me.

The day we had him cremated, we all went out to the house. Ground search and rescue had been cleaning up that area. The field had been drained. The vehicles had been pulled out. We sat there and threw rocks at the house. There was something therapeutic in throwing rocks at something still standing in that area. We weren’t supposed to go in the house but I did. The floor was all bubbled up. I remember seeing some of Colton’s pictures on the wall and I took them down because I couldn’t stand the thought of them ripping down the house with his pictures in it.

The next day was Natalie’s funeral. Courtney asked me to wear my prom dress because Natalie never got a prom. She wanted everyone to look like a princess.

Somehow, after 13 years, I still fit into my prom dress. Not the most elegant fit. But I wore it. I sobbed so hard during Natalie’s funeral. That’s probably why I didn’t sob at Colton’s. They were back-to-back funerals.

I couldn’t find anything to wear. What does Spider-Man’s mom wear? David’s bridal had given me this beautiful dark blue gown. I overdressed, but Colton wouldn’t have cared. He would have just called me beautiful. He was the only one in the world that ever called me beautiful like that all the time. My dad came out of the bathroom wearing a full-on Spider-Man costume. He says: “Are you OK if I wear this?” It was too tight in an area, but that’s OK. I said: “Dad, of course. I’m not going to tell you not to wear it.”

I chose the church because it was a church I used to attend and I didn’t have to go to Brooklyn. Colton loved the building from the outside. When I got out to go in for his service, there were first responders – ground search and rescue, fire – all lined up. There were hundreds of people. There were people who wore Spider-Man shirts and blue and orange because his favourite colour was blue and orange. We walked down the aisle to Crazy Frog. We played Thunder by Imagine Dragons. I remember saying in my speech: “We debated not playing it, but it is Colton’s favourite song so good luck to y’all.” We played Sunflower by Post Malone because he liked that song too and made us think of him. A little bit of exposure therapy.

I remember telling everybody that it’s OK. I remember addressing Colton’s classmates and Alex’s friends and saying that it’s OK. It didn’t feel right if I didn’t try to talk to Colton’s classmates. I remember saying Colton wouldn’t want us sad forever. I had so many people that needed to know I was thankful and Colton would be thankful. I wouldn’t have this closure and, really, no family would, if it wasn’t for the hundreds of individuals who came forward to help. I got to see Colton. I got to see him one last time.

Jason, who was in command those two days, and deputy fire chief Brett Tetanish, the man I heard on that scanner pleading for that alert, brought my boy home. It came full circle. Jason was paired up with Brett. I hold them very dear to me for what they found, and that was my boy. Because I know it wasn’t rainbows and butterflies.

I’ve had people come up to me since and say I saved lives with what I said at the funeral. That I mentally saved lives. That I’m a hero. I don’t feel like one. They’re my heroes. It really didn’t hit me, until months went by, what some of these people experienced while trying to search for these kids. I didn’t realize how much my empathetic self was helping people. How I handled myself at ground search and rescue was more than just healing for me. It was healing for other people.

That’s when I made Colton’s Facebook page. I post thoughts and opinions on the storm. It’s good for me because I don’t want to let go of it yet. Whether climate change is natural or we’ve sped it up, we’re not preparing ourselves for these weather events. It helps me regulate myself and know he’s not forgotten.

There’s this whole generation of kids that are going to remember Colton. They write notes like: “Oh, Colton. I missed you today. Let’s run for Colton even though he didn’t have cancer.” People should be proud of that and proud of their kids. One day, they’ll remember they had a friend die in such a way. They are going to be like: “This is our world and we got to look out for everyone else.”

We ended the funeral with Bloody Mary by Lady Gaga because Colton liked watching Wednesday Addams and loved singing that too. I hugged people for two hours. Two hours of hugging strangers and political people. Somebody whispered to me: “They found her.” There had been four people that had died. I remember driving to the funeral, looking out the window going: “There’s still somebody missing.” They were calling off the search. But the people who came to Colton’s funeral still didn’t give up. They didn’t give up hope. She had been found in Advocate Harbor. They found her. They found her. I remember the church lighting up through the stained glass windows. It got really bright and I remember thinking: “I’m going to get through this.”

This testimonial was produced with the help of the Climate disaster project; thanks to Sean Holman, Aldyn Chwelos, Darren Schuettler, Ricardo Garcia, Cristine Gerk, Tracy Sherlock, Lisa Taylor.