WELLINGTON, Fla. — Families in Florida said they're having trouble getting their loved ones home from Israel as many flights are either sold out or canceled.
The Rockmachers of Wellington said they looked for flights on Saturday night in an effort to get their two children home, but the earliest one was for Wednesday.
"That was the next possible available flight, and there were no flights after that, so it was getting on that flight or who knows when the next possible flight will be," father Warren Rockmacher said. "I didn't sleep last night. She (his wife) didn't sleep last night, and we've been flying on adrenaline I think since last Saturday morning."
Wellington
Young adults from Wellington are in Israel helping with relief
His children, son David Rockmacher, 18, and Talia Rockmacher, 20, boarded a 12-hour overnight flight from Israel and landed Wednesday morning in Miami.
"The unknown of what could happen and now knowing that they're not there, I was just overjoyed," mother Vivian Rockmacher said.
Both of their children were in Israel for school and started volunteering to help people impacted by the war.
"My school, we adopted a paratroop unit, and we were doing a fundraiser to get them supplies," David Rockmacher, who flew in from Israel, said. "It's a school of 220 guys and within the first hour we managed to raise $100,000 for this unit, and I think they got up to $300,000."
He said Wednesday his classmates celebrated with the soldiers, but he was already on his flight back home to South Florida.
"My phone is constantly blowing up, 'Can anyone drive a soldier here? Who can take supplies up north to this base?'" Talia Rockmacher, who flew in from Israel, said. "Everyone is just uniting."
While in Israel, she volunteered to help with feeding people impacted by the war.
"Do you plan on turning those notifications off?" asked WPTV reporter Joel Lopez.
"No, I don't because I can't. It's my home. It's my community," Talia Rockmacher said. "Even if it doesn't relate to me now because I'm a thousand miles away, we have to stick together."
She said in the few hours that she's been home, she jumps at sounds that resemble sirens.
"In the car this morning on my way home from the airport, I had my headphones on and in the song, it sounded like the beginning of a siren, and I was half asleep, and I jumped up cause you're still very on guard," Talia Rockmacher said.
The two said they plan to continue their advocacy in Florida and raise awareness of the war.
For others like Leib Ezagui, he's been searching for flights to bring his sister home from Israel since Sunday.
"There's no flights," Ezagui said. "It's dangerous, and people are not sure what's going to happen next."
He's hoping Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis' executive order signed Thursday, which is meant to rescue Floridians from Israel, will bring his sister home safe.
"At first she didn't want to. She said, 'You know what? I'll stay here, no big deal,'" Ezagui said. "She was in the north. It's not a big deal, and now as things escalated, she's like, 'I need to get out of here,' and there's nothing (no flights) left."
