2024 tornado outbreak: Volunteer working to recover victims’ digital data

OMAHA, Neb. (WOWT) - Chuck Peters knows what it’s like to deal with disaster. A few years back, fire damaged his home.

“Having gone through that before, we realized very quickly the things we missed most: photos, important documents, things we needed to get our life back,” Peters said.

After watching all the volunteers helping people recover from the April 26 tornado outbreak, Peters wanted to help -- so he reached out, and with his experience of dealing with his own personal disaster, offered support and information for people going through the tragedy and now having to deal with the insurance process. Things grew from there.

TORNADO RECOVERY

How to help — and find help

Here are ways you can assist those in Nebraska and Iowa who are recovering from tornadoes that hit on Friday, April 26.

“That kind of evolved into conversation about data recovery, and it kind of dawned on me I (have) a certain set of skills I can apply to help people,” he said.

Many of those who were caught up in the storm worry about finding personal items like photos, special documents -- things that can’t be replaced. A lot of those items are on their PCs, and in all the confusion surrounding a life-changing event, Peters believes some people don’t think about their computer and the memories and information stored on it.

“You really don’t. I mean, those people certainly don’t factor a total loss into the equation,” Peters said. “Some people who are a little more progressive will put things on a removable hard drive, but if the hard drive is in the house when the house is hit, it’s going to get caught up in that too.”

Peters says he has three decades of PC building and cybersecurity experience. He’s offering a free service to storm victims to help recover data and repair computers, as well as assisting with the insurance process -- walking them down a path he’s recently been down himself.

“My goal is just to kind of get people back on their feet and working again, because frankly, the computer is super critical during that insurance process when you’re doing correspondence with your insurance company.”

TORNADO SURVEY

National Weather Service issues first official report on Friday’s storm

At least 9 tornadoes confirmed with 5 significant EF-3 tornado paths identified.

Peters tells 6 News he’s worked on about a half-dozen computers so far. Those looking for data recovery assistance may email Peters.

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