Woman and her dog missing after mudflows slam parts of San Bernardino County
John Dyer | The Desert Sun
RENO — While many were celebrating the end of the wet and sometimes windy month of July, the story of a San Bernardino County couple fighting for their lives and their dog has been quietly unfolding.
Their stories have been shared across social media, and they appear to be connected to last week’s mudslides and flooding that shut down Interstate 15 in two locations in the County, including the community of Palm Springs.
The couple, whose identity remains under wraps, is reported to be suffering from severe injuries to both their legs and their dog.
According to a post on Facebook, the man, identified in the caption as Andrew Gattis. He and his wife, Heather, have been married for nine years and have a 13-year-old dog named Lilly. They have a daughter, and both Heather and Lilly are active in school.
The post said the couple has been driving from Nevada to visit their daughter as well as other relatives in California.
The post said that Heather told the couple that they had “just been hit with a lot of mud, so they are going back and forth to California.”
A photo posted by Heather Gattis at 5:09 p.m. July 12, 2019, on an online post on Facebook. (Courtesy of Heather Gattis)
It said that the couple had been on their way to go visit their daughter before the flooding hit, and that Heather told her husband that she was taking some time to rest and take a “trip.”
The post did not say when the couple had left to go home or where they were going.
“Please don’t worry! Please be safe and I’ll see you soon, Heather,” the post was directed to a friend in Hawaii.
“Please don’t stay and worry too much, we love you and that’s why we’re going to leave you, it was just a little bit of rain,” it said.
The couple was scheduled to fly back from Hawaii to California on July 18, according to the post.
The couple, who were married in 1998, is reported to be “in extremely poor health” and is being cared for at a shelter in Reno