Veteran trapped in bed by Aug. 24 storm at Town & Country MHP

James Barnowsky, 84, was lying in his bed at 2 a.m., Aug. 24, when he heard a big storm going by his home in Town & Country Mobile Home Park. He rolled over.
Then he saw a big flash, and two minutes later there was a loud bam and he said it seemed like the whole earth opened up. His roof came falling in on him, pinning him to his bed. A huge branch was now next to him in his bed.
Barnowsky said the Van Buren Township police and fire department arrived. They worked to free him and asked him to put his arms through the hole in the wall. He did and they were able to pull him out and carry him to the stretcher, then to the waiting HVA ambulance.
He said the emergency workers later crawled into his home and determined if he had rolled over six inches, the tree would have killed him.
“I lost everything,” Barnowsky said he told the nurse at the VA Hospital, apologizing for being in his underwear when he arrived. She said that they were all veterans and, “We will take care of you.”
Barnowsky had served in the Air Force from 1958 to 1965.
He was discharged from the hospital and then brought to the emergency room two days later.
He said groups set out to help him. The Red Cross gave him $250 for a motel room and later gave him $300 more to extend his stay. He was staying at the Red Oak Motel in Van Buren Township. The Fallen Soldiers worked to get him aid. At the VA Hospital he received four big bags of new clothes and shoes to wear, since he had none.
Barnowsky said three months earlier he had two major heart procedures and so he had to go in for that to be checked out. He said there was no damage to his heart. But, he said, the stress of the ordeal has him forgetting things now and stopping in the middle of sentences.
He said he had no insurance on his home and recently got a tag on the door of his demolished home saying his lot rent was due.
He said he had been warning the mobile home park management about their tree and trimming it as he could. He was afraid it would fall on him home. He said they told him that the tree limb came as a result of an “act of God,” but he has filed a complaint against the park.
Detroit News Channel 7 wanted to do an interview with him and the VA Hospital staff wouldn’t let the crew in for the interview. They planned to come back to interview him.
He said Channel 7 told him that they couldn’t do it, but someone needs to set up a GoFundMe account on the internet for him and they could put the address on TV.
He said he didn’t know what GoFundMe was and wasn’t on the internet. He said people could donate to Serviceman in Need of Help at the Ann Arbor Bank in Ypsilanti, MI.
He said before this happened, he used to get free food from churches to take to those in need and now he finds he is the one in need.
Barnowsky has advertised the sale of used cars in the Independent for several years, but he said that business is no more. His phone number is (734) 695-0819.