Niagara Falls Review e-edition

Hurricane changes course for OHL twins Jacob and Andrew LeBlanc

Port Colborne brothers wouldn’t be hockey players if storm hadn’t destroyed their family home in the Cayman Islands

JOSH BROWN WATERLOO REGION RECORD

Twins Andrew and Jacob LeBlanc have never visited the Cayman Islands.

But they’ve heard the stories. Like how their parents, Sheila and Joe, both left Canada for a different life and met in Grand Cayman, the biggest of three islands in the western Caribbean country.

Like how they were born one minute apart — Jacob arriving first — in the capital city of George Town and were destined for a childhood of sun, beaches and warm weather.

And how everything changed in 2004, when they were just two months old, after hurricane Ivan destroyed their home and belongings and forced their family to return to Ontario where the duo ultimately got into hockey and became top prospects for the Kitchener Rangers.

“If it weren’t for — as bad as it was — the hurricane that wiped everything out, we wouldn’t be here,” said Andrew, 17. “It’s just a crazy sequence of events that brought us to where we’re at now.”

Sheila LeBlanc, nee Nagy, was in her 20s when she left for the Cayman Islands in 1996.

“I was a nurse working in inner-city Detroit and I just thought I wanted to live somewhere with palm trees,” she recalled.

“It was as simple as that. I needed a break from the hustle and bustle. I was single and I just moved down there.”

She found a job with the Cayman Islands Health Services Authority, sunk her toes into the sand and started enjoying island life.

Joe LeBlanc was a heating, ventilation and air conditioning technician from London, Ont., who also felt the need to head south and arrived in Grand Cayman about a year later.

The two met and got a house on the beach in Spotts, just outside George Town.

“It was fantastic,” said Sheila. “You meet people from all over the world. You learn about different cultures. Your friends become your family because you’re so far away from your family.”

When they decided it was time to have children, Kiara came first, a blond bundle of joy that stole the hearts of her loving parents.

“It was a bit of a struggle conceiving her,” said Sheila. “Then, out of the blue, eight months later I was pregnant with twins.”

Identical twins to boot. People had trouble telling Jacob and Andrew apart. But not Sheila. The tone of a cry, subtle facial features, the rhythmic breathing when held close and, later, the pitch of their voice. These are things a mother knows.

“I used to have to colour code them for daycare,” she said. “Jacob was always green and blue and Andrew was always reds and oranges.

“But to me, they didn’t look at all alike.”

Life was good, albeit busy with three little ones in the house.

So, a trip to see her parents, Susan and Attila, in her hometown of Port Colborne seemed like the perfect tonic to escape the scorching Caribbean summer and to get a little help.

It was supposed to be a twomonth visit, with the family returning Sept. 11, 2004. But news of incoming weather extended their stay.

“The storm came in on the 11th and the 12th,” said Sheila. “It was a Category 5.

“It completely destroyed the island.”

It was dubbed hurricane Ivan, though there was also a tornado and tidal wave in the melee.

“There was no power, no water,” said Sheila.

“Not only was there the wind but there was major flooding. There were people stuck in their houses, holding their children on refrigerators with water up to their neck. It was really, really scary.”

Roofs had blown off and some buildings were just gone. Cars and houses were submerged in water. People were covered in rashes from the filth and sewage. Gasoline, food and clean water were scarce.

“It was just awful,” said Sheila. Joe, who stayed behind, was able to take refuge in the Cayman Islands Hospital since he worked there, but their beachfront home of seven years was washed away by the ocean.

“The only thing I said to him was ‘Save my pictures,’ ” recalled Sheila. “We saved my pictures, but we didn’t have anything else really.”

The LeBlancs had lived through hurricanes before. They’d seen waves crashing into homes and neighbours rally to carry furniture and people to safety. But hurricane Ivan was different.

“It was just total devastation,” said Sheila, who returned to the island two days after the storm hit to assess the damage.

The smell of salt in the air was overwhelming. The heat was intense. The roar of power generators was deafening. And her neighbourhood was unrecognizable.

“You’re completely disoriented,” she said. “You can’t tell where you are. There are no landmarks anymore or street signs. The roads are covered in sand. You get lost. It’s the strangest sensation.”

The people in the Cayman Islands started rebuilding. But the cost of living had tripled.

Just to send the three children to school was about $3,000 a month.

Joe stayed for three months to help with the effort. Sheila quit her job, gathered what she could and returned to Port Colborne for good.

“There were no telephones working so I didn’t get to call friends or say goodbye,” she said. “I had to walk away from my job, all of my friends and anything that was left. It was very hard because I loved living there. It was our life. I started over at 38 with no job or house.”

The LeBlancs moved in with Sheila’s parents for a bit and then rented a cottage. Sheila and Joe split up in 2008. Today, she works for Niagara Region Public Health. But she can still smell the salt water when hurricanes hit the news.

“I get anxious every hurricane season,” she said. “I watch it and it’s been 17 years. I keep in touch with my friends down there. It’s anxiety provoking.”

But her family is safe. Kiara is now 18 and being in Canada meant the boys were able to get into hockey. Both starred for Welland’s Southern Tier Admirals before Andrew, a centre, was selected by the Rangers in the first round of last year’s Ontario Hockey League draft. Jacob, who plays defence, was Kitchener’s next pick in the third round.

Both are expected to be pillars for the Rangers for at least the next three seasons.

“I’m just so proud of them,” said Sheila.

“Being a single mother, we didn’t have a lot of money that other families had for training and opportunities,” she said.

“People have been very kind to us and very generous. They (the twins) have worked really hard for this. I’m so excited for them.”

Money has been tight, so neither twin has been to the Cayman Islands yet. But they know their roots.

“I’ve wanted to go there my whole life. Hopefully, sometime we can get down there,” said Andrew, as it would be nice to see where they were born. “I’m really looking forward to that and I think it would be a great experience.”

The boys wonder if they’d be surfers, cricketers or rugby players had they stayed in Grand Cayman. One thing is for certain, they wouldn’t be preparing for their OHL debut.

“Hockey is everything to us. It’s part of who we are today, so it has had a huge impact on us,” said Jacob. “If it wasn’t for everything that happened and us moving to Canada, we definitely wouldn’t have been hockey players. It’s all worked out in a good way.”

Josh Brown is a Waterloo Region-based reporter focusing on sports for The Record. Reach him via email: jbrown@therecord.com

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2021-09-16T07:00:00.0000000Z

2021-09-16T07:00:00.0000000Z

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