Build it stronger, build it safer, build it back, fast.

Welcome back to the Sunday story and part two of our series

on how badly we as a nation do at rebuilding after a big storm knocks us down.

Laura Sullivan and the crew at Frontline have been following along

as North Carolina struggles to bounce back after Helene.

In Houston, they learned you can't always engineer your way out of danger.

Now they're looking for answers in another storm-prone area, New York and New Jersey Sea Coast,

to see how they've done in the years since Superstorm Sandy.

The idea there? Get out of the way of the water.

In 2012, Superstorm Sandy sent more than 12 feet of water

over communities along the coast of New York and New Jersey.

It was one of the worst flooding events in New York's history.

Recently, we headed back to some of the neighborhoods we first visited in the aftermath of Sandy.

And even though 13 years had passed since the storm, it almost felt like they were trapped in time,

midway through a recovery.

Here on Staten Island's seacoast, the community used to be tight-knit, with families

living in little bungalows.

Now it feels desolate.

After the storm, some residents used recovery money to elevate their homes really high.

Others took a buyout from the federal government.

Their homes were leveled. And some did nothing.

Their houses sit right as they were the night of the storm.

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