In October, Hurricane Michael made landfall southeast of Panama City, Fla., placing the town and its nearly 40,000 residents directly in the path of the most intense area of the storm — the eyewall. With winds gusting over 150 miles per hour, Michael was the strongest hurricane to ever hit the Florida Panhandle, causing 60 deaths and more than $15 billion in damages.

Mark Bateman, an associate pastor at St. Andrew Baptist Church in Panama City, had evacuated to Jacksonville to ride out the storm. When he returned the following day, he found that the hurricane had completely devastated the town. Many buildings had been destroyed or damaged by the high winds and flying debris, and much of the area became a communications dead zone due to outages.

But the truck Bateman was using had OnStar, with working Hands-Free Calling* functionality and the available WiFi® Hotspot.* In the days following the hurricane, these connections would provide an invaluable lifeline to the outside world as he went door-to-door to check on the 800 members of his congregation and began the process of rebuilding his community.

This is his story.