There was a loud crack, and then screaming. Among the howling wind and the pummeling rain that tore through the Deluna Village Mobile Home Park Tuesday night, a tree limb fell onto a trailer killing a 2-year-old child inside.

The young girl, Zaryanna Dillian, would become the only reported fatality in the area as Tropical Storm Gordon tore through the Panhandle Tuesday evening.

The 200-home mobile home park on West Bobe Street was chaotic in the hours after 8:40 p.m. when the fallen limb was reported. First it was EMS, Escambia County Fire and the Escambia County Sheriff’s Office. They barricaded the area with a special operations center and patrol cars, whose flashing lights acted as the only obvious marker of the tragedy in an otherwise dark complex.

Michael Barradas lives two trailers away and came running out when he heard the crack. He once promised himself that if he ever witnessed a tragedy, he wouldn’t stand idly by.

“I ran outside and yelled, 'Is everyone OK?'" Barradas said. “And she said, 'No, my baby’s in there.'"

He ran to get a flashlight, leaving his own 1-year-old at home with his fiancee as he tried to help.

“By the time I got back, the lady was inside screaming and crying and the baby had stopped crying, and the guy said the baby had died,” he said.

Still, first responders worked through the night as worried neighbors stood by watching firefighters use chainsaws to try to gain access to Zaryanna.

Neighbor Amanda Ray said she heard the almost indecipherable scream above the howling winds around 9 p.m. from her own trailer a few doors down. Her own two babies lay sleeping inside as she stood watching the park’s winding streets flood and wash out.

“It was just awful,” she said.

Barradas said he didn’t know his neighbors well, but his family and theirs were friendly as they were coming and going through the area. The family had been out grilling earlier in the day Tuesday, Barradas said, laughing and joking as they spent the last few hours of good weather together before the storm hit.

On Wednesday morning, the complex remained quiet, but remnants of the night before remained. Washed out pavement. Debris. Pools of stormwater. Several residents walked or slowly drove by the trailer, which was situated on a curve in the far back of the West Bobe Street trailer park.

Barradas didn't sleep much. He shook every time his son cried through the night. He and his fiancee took Wednesday off work to wait out the remainder of the storm.

"The baby was (2 years old), my son's one year and two months, so I mean that's very tough, hearing a baby cry knowing they're trapped and you can't help," he said.

Editor's note: Neighbors originally believed 2-year-old Zaryanna Dillian was 10 months old, but her name and age were released Wednesday evening.

Emma Kennedy can be reached at ekennedy@pnj.com or 850-435-8680.