Snow-Stranded Tulsans: Kids Play While Adults Worry

Dan Bewley, News On 6

TULSA, Oklahoma -- Life is slowly starting to get back to normal in Tulsa, but there are many people who have been trapped inside their homes all week and still can't get out.

They're doing whatever they can to get by in this winter weather.

It hasn't snowed in two days but this massive build up is having lasting effects. Residents in one west Tulsa apartment complex have started to take things in their own hands.

While the kids play, the adults worry and wonder: when will the snow melt away and will they ever get their cars out of the mountains of drifts?

"We've been stranded here since the storm," said Tulsa resident Susan Banks.

Susan Banks lives in Sandy Park, an apartment complex under control of the Tulsa Housing Authority. She and her neighbors haven't been able to leave since the storm began on Tuesday.

She says she went two days without heat and now her building does not have water.

"It's very frustrating, it's very - it makes you feel like that you're not worth anything," Banks said.

"I couldn't even open my door, like, Wednesday. I couldn't open my door at all," said DeShawn Buckley, Tulsa resident.

DeShawn Buckley lives a few doors down from Banks. Her apartment was flanked with nearly six-foot tall snow drifts and she hasn't been outside since Tuesday.

"It's bad. You get cabin fever after a while," she said.

But there was some good news on Thursday.

"We're trying to get around and do some things for some people and stuff like that," said Tulsa resident Eugene Ford.

Some of Buckley's relatives made a grocery store run and dropped off bag after bag of food and necessities.

"Everybody needs to be trying to help somebody and check on people around here. Especially now, I mean, we ain't ever seen this kind of snow before," Ford said.

Banks is now able to get out, but she says the last two and-a-half days is something she never wants to repeat.

"You know you just got to, kind of, be on survival mode trying to make sure that your family's taken care of when nobody wants to help," said Tulsa resident Susan Banks.