David Jones, 64, walked 30 miles from South Carolina to Tennessee to attend his daughter’s wedding. After Hurricane Helene, the roads, covered in debris, were impassable by car.
A party he wouldn’t have missed for anything in the world. David Jones, a 64-year-old American, walked 48km between the state of South Carolina and that of Tennessee, in the eastern United States, to go to his daughter’s wedding, local media report. The roads were impassable due to the passage of Hurricane Helene.
On the evening of Friday, September 27, David Jones, father of three children, drove through South Carolina towards the town of Johnston City, the location of the wedding of his eldest daughter, Elizabeth, who was to be married the next day.
The sixty-year-old was suddenly blocked by security barriers while he was on Interstate 26. The cause was the passage of Hurricane Helene, which crossed the United States from Florida to South Carolina, causing more than 200 deaths. In its path, it caused extensive material damage, destroying bridges and toppling trees and electrical poles.
“I want to be there to accompany him to the altar”
Seeing several police officers on the road, David Jones goes to meet them and asks them if he can drive. Without success, since he received the order from an agent to turn back.
“No one goes to Johnston City,” the agent assures him, arguing that all the roads are closed with bad weather.
“I told him: ‘Sir, you don’t understand. My daughter is getting married (Saturday) at 11 a.m. and I want to be there to accompany her to the altar,'” the father told the channel American USA TODAY.
A hike in the middle of the night among the debris
Despite the refusals of the police on site, there was no question for David Jones to give up his trip. He therefore decides to leave his vehicle there and finish the journey with the only possible means of transport.
“I took my backpack and left on foot,” the father told ABC News. “It was my only hope.”
With his backpack loaded with a change of clothes, David Jones still doesn’t know what journey awaits him. In the middle of the night, he finds himself slaloming between debris of all kinds, lighting himself simply using his cell phone.
Before leaving, he fortunately had the idea of taking a road reflector that was in his car. He uses it all along his route to avoid having an accident.
Stuck in the mud
At one point, David Jones bordered on tragedy. “I sank into the mud,” he remembers, referring to the feeling of being stuck in “quicksand.”
“I slowly moved each leg until I could get back on firmer ground,” allowing him to free himself, he breathes.
The road is long, but David Jones, who has already run a marathon twice, is in good physical shape. He claims to have never been discouraged. “I just put one foot in front of the other and kept this mantra in mind: my daughter is getting married at 11 a.m. and I’m going to walk her down the aisle,” he swears.
Help from a police officer and an ex-colleague
During this night hike, David Jones also fortunately receives help from a police officer. “Are you the one trying to attend your daughter’s wedding?” the agent asks.
“I replied: ‘Yes, sir, how did you know that?'”, recalls the sixty-year-old. “We’re all talking about you,” the member of the police responds with a smile.
The agent offers David Jones a ride in his vehicle and takes him to a neighboring town to shorten his journey. David Jones then hits the road again on foot, before accidentally meeting a former colleague who takes him hitchhiking. Chance encounters which allowed the American to arrive on time.
Arrived just in time
David Jones finally arrived in Johnston City on Saturday, September 28 around 7:30 a.m. While his journey was only supposed to last 2 hours by car, he ultimately spent 7 hours stuck behind the wheel, before walking more than 5 hours.
Throughout this time, the sixty-year-old chose not to inform his daughter of his journey. “I didn’t want to upset her or distract her in any way” while she was in the middle of preparations, explains David Jones.
She only discovered what happened to her that Saturday. “I could never have imagined what really happened,” she confided afterwards.
Before the ceremony begins, the father of the family will just have time to take a shower and change his clothes. As a wedding gift, David Jones gives the reflector he used during his night hike. “It should serve as a reminder to be protective of each other, especially in the darkest hours, as it was for me,” he explains.
