adopted, but some already had families who had been forced to evacuate. the government-run shelters will not allow pets. reporter: alyssa batrusted ts building, built in 2008, to not flood. since we didn t flood in the other storms, we felt we might get some water, but we had no idea that we would get the flood that we did. reporter: but the water from the storm surged unexpectedly, threatening the lives of the animals and in spite of the danger to themselves, phylicia and her coworkers desperately tried to save the dogs by keeping their kracrates above t rising waters. water was about this high. with the water now chest high and the building flooding, they sought shelter. making sure that everything would be safe, to try to put it up high and we went up in the manhole. the manhole is the access to