Stacy Bennett has revealed her husband’s final, terrified words before he drowned in floodwaters that engulfed his truck.
Joshua Bennett, 34, of Palm Bay, Florida, was on a coffee run Monday when historic rainfall transformed local streets into raging rivers. His wife, Stacy Bennett, told WESH2 that he reached her through a FaceTime call as the water rose around him.
“He called me on FaceTime, and he was just crying like, ‘I don’t know what to do, I don’t know what to do,'” she said.
She urged him to smash his truck window and escape. The call dropped suddenly. She called 911 and spent hours trying to get help for him, but rescuers could not reach him in time.
Palm Bay police later found Bennett dead inside the submerged vehicle on a suburban street. He was one of two fatalities in a storm that dumped up to 20 inches of rain across parts of Florida in just 12 hours, officials said. Hundreds of other residents required rescue from the floodwaters.
Stacy Bennett described her husband as an “amazing husband and dad” who was “super obsessed” with their four children. The couple met while studying bio pre-med in college. Their family includes twin girls born prematurely, a son, and another daughter.
“He has a son and three daughters,” she said. “He loved to do activities with them.”
The widow spoke about the devastating void left by his death. “Now we’re essentially starting from scratch,” she said. “He’s not here. I don’t have my support system. They don’t have their father.”
The storm that killed Bennett and one other person brought catastrophic flooding to Brevard County and surrounding areas, with emergency crews conducting hundreds of water rescues as roads became impassable and homes took on water.