Dr. Annie Gray

It was like a horror movie, you know?

These type of movies where you see a tsunami.

It was actually not a blue wave, but it was a brownish wave.

There was also a smell of sulfur.

It was a very strong smell.

Trying to escape the muddy floodwaters, strewn with scattered pieces of wreckage, Lady flees up a nearby hill.

It was a desperate move.

Some people were screaming, come up, come up.

So we went up with my mother and my two children.

And when we got up, we could see the whole city floating and all the water around it.

We thought we were going to be safe up there.

But when we were there, we realized it was worse.

And we realized that it was not safe to stay there because we could also be swept away by mudslides.

And the place where we were staying could fall away too.

So we decided to go back down.

We just couldn't distinguish anything because the brownish mud was everywhere.

We really thank God that we could wake up and see the light of day, and so we thought that we could keep going.

Once the water levels go down, Lady and her family manage to evacuate and end up at one of the refuge centres.

Lady and her family are officially registered as victims of the Vargas tragedy.

They spent Christmas in a shelter.