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Even tornado damage couldn't stop this Amazon crew from delivering a Dallas woman's package
DALLAS — Christine Tonolini had just gotten home from the hotel where her family was staying when an Amazon delivery van pulled up in her Northwest Dallas neighborhood.
It was the last thing she was expecting.
Tonolini’s home was badly damaged by the EF-3 tornado that tore through her neighborhood Sunday night. On one side of the house, you can see the sky through one of the bedrooms.
“We were hunkering down in the hallway,” Tonolini said. “I thought for sure we’d be at least injured, but the animals were fine, we were fine.”
They stayed the night at a hotel after the tornado ripped through and had come back to survey the damage in the daylight Monday morning.
But there was too much debris. The street was completely blocked.
“We were trying to get back home, but we couldn’t, we had to park like three or four blocks up and walk down,” Tonolini explained.
It took them an hour just to get onto their street.
So, it came much to her surprise when just minutes later an Amazon delivery van pulled right up to her front door.
Christine Tonolini
She wondered how they could have possibly gotten down the street.
“We’ve been moving the trees all down Newcastle Drive,” he told her.
Tonolini was shocked they would take the time and energy to do that.
“Honestly, it’s just an Amazon package,” she explained. “It’s not the end of the world [if it’s not delivered].”
To her, that act was incredibly meaningful.
“It was a really selfless thing they did,” Tonolini said.
Other people had been working to remove debris, she said, but that van was the first vehicle that she saw able to actually make it down the street. Once it did, others were able to as well, including Tonolini.
“It was just surprising, we have four dogs and so getting our car to our house meant a lot,” she said.
She asked if she could take her phone out and record the delivery to share what they did. The crew said that would be okay. She tweeted it out, and within a day it had been viewed almost 50,000 times.
It wasn’t only the delivery crew’s clearing effort that touched her. It was the man’s compassion, too.
“He was so nice, oh my gosh,” she said. “You can’t hear it in the video, but when he walks up he’s like, ‘Oh my god, I’m so sorry.'”
Tonolini said the Amazon Help account on Twitter responded to her tweet. WFAA has asked Amazon for a comment.
What was in that package that the crew worked so hard to deliver?
Tonolini is an artist. She’s trying to feature her work online, so her sister bought her a special photography light.
It was a gift that gave in more ways than one.
“Because of that, we were able to actually get our car home,” Tonolini said.