Local family remembers surviving Hurricane Katrina, worries about Isaac

LIBERTY, Mo. - One Liberty, Mo., family is hoping a hurricane doesn't destroy yet another of their homes. Mitch Weber spoke with them about surviving Hurricane Katrina and why they still plan to move back to New Orleans.

Seven years ago, the Greely family packed up for what they thought would just be a weekend. Like many viewers, they watched from afar as the hurricane headed right into New Orleans.

"What goes through my mind when I hear about a hurricane coming towards New Orleans is run, get out, don't take any chances," Eric Greely, Sr. said.

New Orleans is still home to Eric and Desha Greely and their three kids, even though they had nothing to go back home to after Katrina.

"We lost everything, we lost the house, lost two cars, a lot of memories, a lot of history," he said. "Again, (we) just thank God for life."

And to think seven years ago, they almost stayed home through the hurricane -- just like they did months earlier for the storm before Katrina.

"Some of the neighbors that lived around us we still don't know where they are," Desha Greely said.

Eric Greely Sr. is now an assistant principal at Liberty High School, but Desha's job took her back to New Orleans. The rest of the family plans to join her there next summer.

The family even has a new home in New Orleans -- in the same area where Katrina destroyed their old one.

Desha flew back to Liberty on Monday night to escape the storm. But she said she noticed a difference in the city's preparations before she left.

"It felt like the city and the state, the governor and the mayor, everybody in the city was talking now," she explained.

When Katrina hit, the Greelys didn't have flood insurance because they didn't live in a flood plain. But they've made sure their new house is covered this time around.