Father remembers hiding under mattress during Newnan tornado. Now, his family continues to rebuild their lives

NEWNAN, Ga. — On March 26, 2021, Michael Phillips finished his work shift driving trucks, but he couldn’t go home.

"It's just a major setback not to have somewhere to go to," Phillips said at the time.

The day before, an E-4 tornado ripped through Newnan and devastated parts of Coweta County. Phillips had received the weather alert on his phone, yelled "roll call" to his family, and hid with his pregnant fiancé and children in their basement.

"The same mattress that's sitting out here on the trash can is the same one I used to cover my kids, my fiancé and her mom and my uncle with," he said, pointing to the discarded bedding.

At the time he wondered, 'what’s next?'

"Newnan definitely need some help; there's a lot of people that's not going to be right for a while," he said.

Now, one year later, Phillips stood on the front porch of his new home, joking to "please forgive the front yard."

There’s a lot of new for Phillips. 

He moved into the house next to the one he rented when the tornado hit. He helped do repairs on the home, which his landlord considered to be his security deposit.

“We’re trying to buy this place in six months,” he said.

During the interview with 11Alive's Hope Ford, Phillips briefly excused himself, coming back a few minutes later with the chunkiest, smiling baby.

“What you see Fat Daddy?" Phillips lovingly said to his 8-month-old, MJ "Say hey! Hey everybody!”

As if he understood, MJ gave a flirty, toothless smile to the camera. 

“They come to talk to us about that tornado. Remember that tornado? You were in the womb at the time," he told his child.

Besides a new place to rent and a new baby to love on, Phillips has a new side job: a t-shirt printing business, ironically named Powerless Printing. The name was inspired by his experience.

“After the tornado, we were down for maybe seven, eight days without power," he said. "I was running off a generator so, I was considered to be powerless. And that’s the name of it: Powerless Printing."

But with all the new, some things remain the same. 

Drive down most streets and it's easy to spot home with tarps on roofs, insulation exposed, power polls titled; all juxtaposed with folks happy taking a run, going to work, and playing with their children.

The people in Newnan live by the words "one day at a time." It can be difficult, though, to move forward when they sometimes find themselves having to take a step back, community members say.

“Every now and again we have to put a shingle here and put a shingle there when a storm comes through," Phillips said. "The basement flooded a couple times because of storms. My oldest, Marshawn, he hates a thunderstorm, he asks me 'is it gonna be like last time?' I tell him no, that's was rare."

What isn't rare is the people like Phillips who do the work of fixing their homes with their own two hands when they find a spare hour or two. This, on top of working to replace everything they lost.

“I’m working two jobs, my old lady has a job, and I’m printing shirts," he said.

It's easy to understand some of Phillip's frustration with the slow process of rebuilding his home and his city. FEMA denied the city crucial federal aid.

“I didn’t understand that cause this was the worst thing to happen to Newnan period," he said. "Probably won’t happen no time soon and I just don’t see how they did not do more. People that don’t have to sleep here, that don’t have to go through the changes, they don’t really care."

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Phillips added he's been denied help in his own backyard.

“I probably still got applications right now that’s probably pending. I know some families received credits from the power company and on their water bills. I didn't," he said. "And, you can't go to the financial aid office. How can I spend all day waiting to talk to someone about aid when I have to work?"

Despite it all, Phillips looks down at his baby and repeatedly uttered, "It's okay though. We got through it. One day at a time."

Phillips will move forward, hoping to build up his t-shirt business. For right now, he takes orders mainly through email, phone, and word of mouth. He also hopes to see Newnan return to the city it was once before. 

And even though Phillips stands on his front porch, thinking, "there's a lot left to do," he's grateful he has a porch to stand on -- and a home to go to.