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Several Long Days Before Arkansas Teacher Finally Reaches Family In Philippines

After several grueling days of not knowing whether her loved ones were alive or dead from a devastating typhoon in the Philippines, a north Arkansas school teacher finally got some good news.

Mylet Trotter is a native Filipino who immigrated to the U.S. in 1990 and now teaches 6th grade at Pinkston Middle School in Mountain Home.

“My family is still in the Philippines, I have two brothers there. Together they have a dozen children, so we were really worried about them,” Trotter said.

Repeated attempts to reach them failed.

“Everything was down, we couldn’t call. Telephones were down. We tried every possible way to get a hold of them.”

Finally Trotter says social media came through.

“Good old Facebook,” she said with a laugh. “We were so relieved and grateful.”

But in an interview with KUAR, she said it took several long days.

“We (initially) checked Facebook. There was no update or anything. Then we posted a message to our families and three days later they responded that they were fine and posted some pictures of the slight damage, and I’m talking slight as compared to thousands and thousands of people that have lost their homes and their lives there.”

It’s expected the death toll from Typhoon Haiyan will be in the thousands. Trotter says she’d like to go back to help, but can’t because of work and her family here. But she is sending supplies to help family members recover.

Michael Hibblen was a journalist for KUAR News from May 2009 — December 2022. During his final 10 years with the station, he served as News Director. In January 2023, he was hired by Arkansas PBS to become its Senior Producer/ Director of Public Affairs.