Residents continue to tell heart-wrenching stories of how they lost their loved ones during last month's floods. The Al-Jihani family went out for a picnic on that day and lost three of their five family members to the raging floodwaters. On that morning, Monawar Krayyem Al-Jihani, who lives in an area in Jeddah that was untouched by the floods, had dropped off his three daughters and their mother at his family's farm. He then went to work. When he returned later, his wife, 33, and daughters between the ages of four and eight, were all dead. “I arrived at my cousin's farm around six in the morning and left to go to work. The last contact I had with my wife was a call before the disaster,” said Al-Jihani, who sells sheep for a living. When he reached the area where his sheep were kept, it was raining heavily. He could not make calls on his phone. Then the flood started, he said. He was able to get to safety but could not contact his wife. He did not know that while he managed to find safe ground, his family were perishing in the flood. His cousin later told him that his wife had tried to save their daughters but fell down and could not get up again. Abdullah Al-Sulami, a 30-year-old father of three, also lost his wife and children. The Al-Sulami family lived in a first floor apartment. The flood was so powerful it broke open their door and drowned everyone. Al-Sulami's wife of 25 was found dead, holding on to her three children. “I lost my whole family. My six-year-old daughter, four-year-old son, four-month-old daughter and my sisters,” he said. He also lost his car and house. “There is nothing left for me, I have no hope for the future,” he said. According to Al-Salami's brother, Fahad, the family did not receive any help from the authorities on that day. They had to transport the bodies to the hospital and then had to wait a long time to get death certificates, he said.
