HOLLYWOOD, Fla. – It has been nearly two weeks since Sissel Johnson and her 85-year-old mother, Virginia Mosvold, were rescued, after surviving Hurricane Dorian, a Category 5 storm that devastated Abaco and Grand Bahama.
As the flood waters were rising in their Grand Bahama home, the family punctured holes in the drywall to keep their heads above water. For three days, Mosvold was floating in a makeshift hammock held together by electric wires. She held onto the refrigerator, which was wedged in a corner.
"We said goodbye to her a few times and told her we loved her," Johnson, 51, told the South Florida SunSentinel. "It's by the grace of God that she survived."
After the harrowing ordeal and the touch and go rescue, Johnson and Mosvold traveled to South Florida. On Friday morning, doctors at Memorial Regional Hospital in Hollywood were still treating Mosvold for pneumonia and leg infections.
Johnson said she and her husband George Johnson are staying with friends in South Florida. They lost their home and their Ol'Freetown Farm in Grand Bahama. Hundreds of their animals died and a 41-year-old farm employee drowned and vanished.
Bahamian authorities said the death toll stands at 50 and about 1,300 people are listed as missing.