As Cyclone Seroja tore through the Western Australia town of Northampton one year ago, one of the school principals stayed on the telephone to the local priest as the house around the cleric fell apart.
Finally, Father Larry Rodillas got out from under his kitchen table and ran for his life to the school next door, sheltering in a classroom until the category-three storm had passed the next morning.
Saint Mary's principal Ben Will says he is still amazed that no-one in the town, including the priest, was physically hurt.
"We are very lucky that he survived that ordeal without a scratch," Mr Will said.
"It really is incredible that no-one in the community was hurt physically when you think about what was flying through the air that night."
But the impact of Seroja, which hit a huge area of the Midwest and Wheatbelt last April, is still being felt.
Families have left
Two families, with children at the Northampton school, have moved out of town because the disaster left them homeless.
The four children represent about 5 per cent of the Catholic primary school's numbers.
"One, the house was completely destroyed and they chose to move on," Mr Will says.
"Another family was renting, the house was damaged and the house was then sold and they could not find any more accommodation in the town or surrounds so they also had to leave.
Clean-ups and busy bees would normally see parents "pitch in" but Mr Will says he has been reluctant to ask for help from a community that is already under immense pressure.
"I know that everyone is dealing with the same thing," he says.
"Everyone is trying to repair and replace.
"Everyone is also still working, completing their jobs, running businesses or running their farms so I have tried to make sure we do not lean on our community too much because they are all going through the same thing."
Making the best of a bad situation
As for the school's landscape, that has changed completely.
Where the century-old priest's house sat, shipping containers now take up the space to store equipment from destroyed sheds.
Father Rodillas now lives in Geraldton, 50 kilometres away, and travels to Northampton.
Sheets of tin have been cleared up along with hundreds of nails that were discovered in the grounds for months after the cyclone.
Trees that were knocked over have long gone and a remembrance garden has been freshly planted.
It will eventually have a seat near the roses, a nod to the English-style garden that once grew around the presbytery.
A new basketball court will soon be put in to replace the one that was destroyed.
"We have tried to make the best of a bad situation," Mr Will says.
