A Georgia family is grief-stricken after losing three family members, including twin infants, to Hurricane Helene.
As 27-year-old Kobe Williams was with her twin babies inside their trailer home in Thomson when the storm. hit, she spoke on the phone with her father, Obie Williams, and told him she would take her children and shelter in the bathroom, the Associated Press (AP) reported on Thursday.
But when her phone was cut off and the family could not reach her, one of her brothers dodged hazards created by the storm to check on her hours later. When he made it to the residence, he found that a large tree had fallen on the home, killing Kobe and causing her to fall on top of her babies, who also died.
The young woman’s sons were identified as Khyzier and Khazmir, and images show the young mother and the twins cuddling next to each other:
Obie Williams said, “I’d seen pictures when they were born and pictures every day since, but I hadn’t made it out there yet to meet them. Now I’ll never get to meet my grandsons. It’s devastating.”
He added that his daughter, who was nursing the babies, said she was unable to evacuate the area because of her sons.
Per the AP, “The babies, born Aug. 20, are the youngest known victims of a storm that had claimed 200 lives across Florida, Georgia, Tennessee, Virginia and the Carolinas as of Thursday.”
The death toll from the hurricane reached 215 on Friday, the New York Post reported, noting that among the victims are a seven-year-old girl and a four-year-old boy who died in Georgia’s Washington County.
Kobe had been studying to be a nursing assistant but had taken time away to settle into her role as a mother, her father told the AP.
“That was my baby,” he stated. “And everybody loved her.”
In Beech Island, South Carolina, an elderly couple died together in bed when a tree hit by the hurricane’s winds fell onto their home, Breitbart News reported on Thursday.
