Evline Simmons left her job at a grocery store to head home right as snow began falling Tuesday afternoon in metro Atlanta.
She made it only a few miles before her commute quickly became treacherous. Slick roads full of abandoned cars forced her to pull off into a Snellville subdivision, where she became stranded.
“I noticed my car was going backwards, and I started to panic,” the 52-year-old from Lawrenceville recounted. “I said, ‘I know there’s God’s people out here, and someone is gonna help me.‘”
After asking for help and facing several rejections in the bitter cold, Simmons came across JD Laboy. As he struggled to walk in the icy conditions, Laboy offered to help, first checking to see if maybe her car had “snow mode,” which improves a vehicle’s traction, and might allow her to get home safely.
But he quickly realized she was stuck. That’s when he welcomed her to stay the night with his family.
“Without any hesitation, his kind heart was like, ‘Absolutely,’” Simmons said through tears.
Laboy was not the only good Samaritan helping those stranded amid Tuesday’s chaotic snowfall. In stories shared across social media, people took time to help push stranded cars, delivered food to families unable to get home and gave strangers rides to a safe place.
One group helped multiple cars get through the intersection at Old Norcross Road and Oakland Road. Others pushed more than 100 cars to safety in three hours, according to Facebook posts. And road crews worked to get an ambulance through the icy conditions to transport a woman who gave birth while stranded in DeKalb County.
Before Laboy could help Simmons, he needed to assist his wife Brenda, who was also stranded nearby when her car slid sideways on an icy hill on her drive home from work in Smyrna.
He said he was a bit nervous to leave his children, 12-year-old Mateo and 14-year-old Paloma, alone with a stranger. But as a man of faith, he said he trusted God and felt that the kids would be OK with Simmons. Some neighbors checked in on them while JD was gone, and another went with him to help Brenda.
“Both my kids, they cooked and they served a warm meal to our new guest and made sure that she had everything she needed,” Laboy said, becoming tearful. “That just made me very proud.”
After more than an hour of wrangling snow chains and maneuvering the car off the hill, Laboy and his wife returned home safely to their kids and Simmons, who spent the night and hung around until Wednesday afternoon when the roads were finally clear.
Credit: Miguel Martinez-Jimenez
Credit: Miguel Martinez-Jimenez
While metro Atlanta got only 1 or 2 inches of snow, it quickly turned to ice in the midst of the evening commute. Most of the snow — as much as 9 inches in some towns — fell in Middle and South Georgia, where many residents remain hunkered down and some are still without power.
The storm curved farther north into DeKalb and Gwinnett counties than anticipated, catching many drivers off guard. Some spent Tuesday night stranded in their cars or walking to find shelter.
In Gwinnett, where the Laboys live, police dealt with more than 450 calls related to crashes. DeKalb officials declared a state of emergency Wednesday, urging residents to stay off the roads and to shelter in place amid the frigid temperatures. DeKalb received reports of more than 100 stranded vehicles, including fire trucks.
Simmons, who had stayed as late as she could at her Kroger store to help a rush of people getting groceries, said she was struck by the Laboy family’s generosity despite the fact they were complete strangers.
“They were so kind to me, after how many people turned me away and was so mean to me,” Simmons said. “He opened his home to me not knowing who I was.”
Laboy said it gave him the chance to show his kids the right thing to do, see the best in people and treat each other as neighbors.
“It was a beautiful opportunity, just for all of us to come together as neighbors and take care of each other,” he said.
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