I must admit that I am horrible at keeping up with the weather. I had heard that there were going to be storms this day, but I had no clue just how bad it was going to be. Wave after wave of severe storms moved in that morning. Around 9:30 or 10:00, I remember looking outside my back door in complete awe of the clouds that were passing over our house. So eerie, yet intriguing at the same time. I had never seen clouds like this before. In the distance, I could see a huge wall of rain, but at that moment, it was not raining at our house. I tried to grab my camera to take a picture, but of course, my battery was dead. I tried to charge it quickly, but the clouds were moving so fast. By the time it was charged enough, I ran out the front door and got these pictures.
I could hear the noise of the rain in the distance. It was amazing. These pictures really didn't do it justice. I got on facebook and saw that someone had posted this picture:
This is the picture that I wanted! This picture was taken as the storm passed over Meridianville Middle School. So glad someone captured this because I never would have been able to describe it.
Around 11:00, I was debating whether or not I was going to try to make it to the gym that day. I didn't want to get out and be stuck driving in bad weather. I called Jared to see what he thought, and he said it would be okay as long as I kept an eye on the weather and made sure I was home before it got bad again. I finally decided it would be best to just stay home.... good decision. Just before noon, it started to rain again. Our satellite went out. My friend Miranda and I were texting each other saying it was gonna be one of those "curl up on the couch and watch movies all day" days..... and then the power went out. So much for that idea! The rain and wind really got strong then, and of course, I couldn't check the weather... no cable, no internet, not even a radio with batteries. I tried calling Jared at work, but I was told he was in a meeting. He called me back just a few minutes later and said they had moved all of the employees downstairs and that we needed to get in a safe place. I grabbed the girls, pillows, shoes, and Bella's crib mattress, and we went and sat in the bathtub. The girls were fine for the first little while. I tried to explain to Taylor what a tornado was and that if one came we needed to be in there to try to stay safe. She thought it was fun that we were "hiding" from the tornado, but after sitting in the tub for 40 minutes, we were all over it. I finally got the word from Jared that we were okay to come out of the bathroom. The girls and I ate lunch... don't remember what it was now.. probably lunch meat and cucumbers since we had no power to cook or microwave anything. Then I put Bella down for a nap. I tried to read a book while Taylor was drawing and painting, which she loves to do, but she was driving me crazy on this particular occasion because she wanted to draw a rainbow, and she couldn't do it just perfectly. I was bored and texted Miranda joking about debating whether or not to clean my house. I said "I'd sure hate to do all of that work in case a real tornado ends up hitting the house later." Oh, how I wished the power was on and the TV was working. I thought a few hours without power was rough... little did I know what was coming.
I called Jared sometime during the early afternoon and asked if he would be coming home early. He said probably not, but then I got a call from him around 3:00 or so saying that he was leaving work and he was going to stop somewhere to get dinner since the power was out. Also around that same time, my mom got home from work and said her power in Hazel Green was still on, and she would keep me updated on the weather. Jared got home around 4:00pm. My mom called me probably around 4:20 and said the bad weather was coming our way, we needed to get in a safe place, and it was expecting to hit around 4:47pm. We were really wishing we had batteries for our radio, so Jared said, "That's almost 30 minutes away. It'll only take me 10 minutes to run to Publix and get some batteries." I told him to just wait- this wave of bad weather was already on top of us, and we needed to just wait it out.
My mom called back a few minutes later and said, "A tornado is on the ground. Sparkman High School is in immediate danger. You need to take cover." That got us moving a little bit faster. We finally found a flashlight, so we grabbed that, the girls, and Bella's crib mattress again, and of course, I grabbed our dinner (barbeque pork!) that Jared had brought home. (For those who really know me, this is pretty typical; food is very important to me!) The girls and I sat in the bathtub, and after a couple of minutes, Jared said, "I'm going to go look outside really quick." So he walked out of the bathroom, and when he came back, he closed the bathroom door and said that it really didn't look good outside.
This is a picture our friend Nathan took before the tornado hit.
The girls and I were sitting in the bathtub. Jared was sitting on a stool next to the bathtub, and Bella's crib mattress was propped up against the wall "just in case." Just as I received a text from someone, stuff started banging against the house, and I'm not talking like some hail hitting the house. You could definitely tell that it was like flying debris hitting the house. I looked at Jared and said, "Get in!" He immediately jumped in the tub with us and pulled the mattress over us as the house started to shake and rumble. You always hear that a tornado sounds like a train. I never really quite understood what that meant. I would equate it more with a feeling than a sound, I guess. It was as if we were standing right next to train tracks as a train passed by. Actually, I think I blocked out all sound at that moment. I don't remember hearing sounds. (Jared said he remembers hearing the windows bust out and everything.) I remember the shaking of the house, the anxiety, the fear, the expectation that at any moment our roof was going to fly off. For a moment, I let my fear get to me until Jared said, "You.need.to.calm.down," and then I realized my first priority was to try to calm the fears of our daughters. They weren't really crying but were just fearful as well, so I said, "It's going to be okay," and although I was scared and didn't know what would be left of our house, I don't remember ever thinking that those words were untrue.
The "train" was gone after maybe 30 seconds. I flipped open my cell phone to read my text message, and it was my sister-in-law, Kim, saying "Just checking to see if you are ok." Ha. Good timing. I texted her back something to the affect of "We are okay, but I think maybe a tornado just hit our house." We hadn't even left the bathroom to inspect the damage. Jared opened the bathroom door. The window in the spare bedroom had busted out and glass was scattered all the way into the the hallway and our bedroom across the hall. As Jared walked out of the bathroom, I heard our front door fly open and I heard my best friend Miranda, who lives across the street, yell, "Oh my gosh! Are you guys okay?!" I then heard something about "....house is gone!!" I jumped out of the tub but not before she and Jared both disappeared back out the front door. At that time, I had a little moment of hysteria. Taylor stayed in the bathtub, but I carried Bella with me (knowing that she wouldn't stay in the bathtub and there was glass everywhere). The windows in the living room to the front of the house had also broken and glass was shot all the way across the room. I walked from side to side in the living room looking out all of the windows yelling "Jared! Where did you go? Why did you leave?" The rain and wind were still unbelievable, and at this moment, I didn't even know if it was all past us.
I called my sister-in-law Cari, who lives in Meridianville, and my mom to let them know that we were okay but that our neighborhood had been hit by a tornado, and they needed to take cover because I didn't know where it was going next. I tried to calm down, but Cari told me weeks later that she could hear the fear in my voice. By the time I spoke to my mom, her power was out, too, and she said, "I can't help you now" because she didn't know what the weather was doing either. I just told her to be safe. When Jared finally came back inside, he was drenched from head to toe (while still wearing his dressy work clothes) and said, "Those people have no house. They are just walking around with no where to go, and they can't find their son." Still not quite over my hysteria, I kept looking out our back window saying, "Our fence is gone. Our fence is gone." Really? Like that was important at this moment. Jared said, "So what? We had a crappy fence. Now we'll get a new one." I didn't even notice all of the damage to the houses behind us. Then again, it was still raining so hard that I might not have been able to see it.
Nathan took this picture right after the tornado hit. You can see a house where the 2nd story is completely gone, and the house right next to it was wiped down to the foundation. That is the house where Jared saw the people walking around looking for their son.
I called Kim, who lives in Madison, and she said more bad weather was coming in, and it was already on top of Madison. We all got back in the bathroom and waited it out for a little bit longer... how long, I have no idea. After we thought we were in the clear, I grabbed for my tennis shoes (yes, the shoes I had in the bathroom with me were flip flops! ha!) but then decided to put on my rain boots (and when I bought them, Jared thought I would never wear them!). I grabbed a backpack that I had from a Community Emergency Response Team training course I took with other members of the church about 3- 3 1/2 years ago, and we ran across the street to the Forbes' house (Miranda & Nathan). As we ran out our front door, there was one police officer that had just pulled up and parked in our neighbor's driveway. I took the girls to Miranda. She and her daughters were still sitting in their pantry. Then Jared grabbed me and said, "There is a lady out there face down on the ground. You need to go see if you can help her." As I ran out the door, Nathan came up to me and said, "The fireman already checked her. She's dead." Then they told me that they had found the son (he was a teenager, maybe 16-19; the lady who died was his grandmother), and he had a broken femur. I ran to try to find where they were. He had been thrown out into the field behind the house. Two firemen were already with him. I had been running through the flooded road (the rain boots weren't helping too much at this point, but I guess they were better than tennis shoes or flip flops), but I stopped when the water went about waist high. I stood there, not knowing what to do. I was terrified. It was still so incredibly dark outside (I can't explain this darkness.. it wasn't like nighttime. It was just so gray and dark and eerie), at only 5:30-ish in the afternoon, and the lightning was like nothing I had ever seen before. I am normally intrigued by lightning as long as I am somewhere safe, but I was not somewhere safe, and all I could think of was "My mother would kill me if she knew I was standing outside in this right now." I knew it was not safe for us to be outside, but I so desperately wanted to help.
The firemen spotted Jared running up behind me and said, "We need him! You go back inside. There is more coming!" I turned to Jared, and he told me to go back inside. He jumped right into that waist high water, and after he made it across, I turned and ran back towards the Forbes, but just as I started running, it really started to rain again... so much so that I couldn't even see where I was going. Nathan ran up, grabbed my hand, and guided me back to their house. As we were running, a Hispanic couple ran up behind us and yelled "Where are we going?!" The roof of their 2-story brick house had been completely ripped off, and they had two little children. They ran, carrying their children who both were wearing bicycle helmets, and Nathan told them to come with us. We showed them where the bathroom was, and then I ran back into the pantry with Miranda and the girls. Jared helped pull the boy out of the field, and the firemen took him and his mother somewhere to take cover again. (Jared said once they got the boy out of the field they took him and sat him down somewhere, and he let out a huge scream and then passed out.) Jared grabbed more people who no longer were safe in their homes and took them into our house. He said the wind was so strong at that point that he could barely move, and it was starting to hail again.
It finally cleared up enough where we could go outside and actually try to search for people and see what we were doing. I walked out of the Forbes' house just as two paramedics that I see all the time coming into the ER were pulling up. They tried to drive around the curve to where the boy was, but we all screamed at them to stop. The road was so flooded that one car that tried to drive through had already stalled and gotten stuck.
The big truck you see here, I believe, is what the firemen who were first on scene were driving.
I think maybe it was also at this point that our neighbor right next to Nathan and Miranda came running down the street. He and his wife were not at home when the tornado hit, but his parents live on the other side of them, and his children were at his parents' house. They were both at work and couldn't leave because of all of the bad weather coming through. Once he finally got to leave, they had the entrance to our neighborhood blocked off. He just parked his car somewhere and took off running. I can't imagine the fear they must have felt not being with their children and not being able to immediately make sure they were okay. I am so grateful that Jared got off work early that day and that we were all home together.
One of the paramedics that I knew was loading up the boy with the broken femur (I heard later that he had been thrown from the 2nd story of the house... lucky to be alive!). I said a few quick words to her, and then headed down the road looking for people who needed help. I turned down the first road I came to, the one that runs directly behind my house. People were coming out of their houses and walking down the street. I asked everyone if they were okay and if anyone needed help. They all said they were fine. I came across a young adult woman who was carrying a baby who was maybe a year old if that. She was crying and said, "I'm waiting for his parents to come home. He has no shoes, no pants. He was taking a nap when it hit." Another miracle. I came across some guys who pointed me to a house in the cul-de-sac and said they thought some people needed help there. There I ran into a lady with two small children, maybe 3 and 6. She said the older one was bleeding somewhere, but I only saw some minor scratches, and she thought the younger one had been hit in the head with something. He appeared fine. There wasn't much that could be done for him at that moment without having a CT of the head done to make sure he didn't have any internal bleeding. I spotted a police officer and ran over to ask him where we needed to send the injured people. He just kind of shrugged as he pointed to Bollweevil Ln, the main road that runs into our neighborhood, and said, "I guess you can take them over there." I didn't even realize at the time that he was standing amid a bunch of rubble from a house that was no longer there. I ran back to the family and told them we needed to make our way over to Bollweevil but to be careful because there were downed power lines everywhere.
I cut across to Bollweevil and made my way down the street asking everyone if they were okay and if anyone needed anything. I came across a house where the front door had been blown completely off. I could see inside the house and up the stairs. I called out to see if anyone was home but got no response. My road, Old Eli, curves and is U-shaped. When I came to the point where Old Eli meets Bollweevil again, there were downed power lines stretched across the road blocking the path.
This is the day after the tornado. You can see the power lines, but at this point, someone had lowered them down to the ground. Right after the tornado, they were stretched mid-air across the road, so you couldn't just step over them to get by.
I turned around and headed back up Bollweevil stopping to ask people if they needed anything along the way. I did give a little girl who had stepped on something a band-aid. Yay me! I started down Old Eli Rd back towards our house hoping to come back around to the houses that I had missed. By the time I reached our house, the first responders were telling everyone to go back inside because more bad weather was coming through. I never even made it to some of the houses that were hit the worst. I ran back into the pantry, and as we waited out yet another wave of bad storms, we were able to finally eat some of the barbeque that Jared had bought. I was so hungry but at the same time couldn't eat much because my stomach was all in knots. Waiting out this wave of storms seemed so long. I was freezing because I was still in wet clothes, and the girls were all getting tired of being cramped in a little space with all of us on top of each other. Well, maybe I should say the Forbes' girls were tired of being cramped in a little space with Taylor and Bella doing what they do best and antagonizing them and pushing their buttons. I told Miranda, "Well, I guess we won't be watching Survivor tonight... we're just living it!" The Hispanic family was still in the Forbes bathroom, and there were other neighbors in their closet. I don't know how many people Jared had over in our house.
After that wave of bad weather came through, it was dark, and we didn't think there was much we could do to help at this point. A police officer drove up and told people over his megaphone that they needed to move their cars so they could get through. One of our neighbors started yelling,"You should have been here sooner! Where were you 3 hours ago?" Then our next door neighbor pissed some people off (including Jared) because she got mad because someone drove in her yard and messed up her grass, and she said, "Who's going to pay for this? I shouldn't have to!" Really, lady? Some people don't even have a house anymore, and you're worried about your grass??
It wasn't until late that night that people's family members were able to get to them to pick them up and take them somewhere safe. Miranda and I had told Nathan and Jared to go check on our friends from church, the Mechams, who lived just down the road. We just knew that the tornado must've hit their house, too, and they have 4 kids under the age of 5. Just as they were about to leave, more friends from church, the Jones family, drove by our house to check on us. They said they had already been by the Mechams, and although no one answered when they knocked on the door, it didn't appear that their house had been hit at all. I had talked to my mom and Cari several times and found out all of the rest of our family was safe. I had gotten a text from my sister-in-law Alisha at 5:42pm saying, "How are you? First time I've ever been in a tornado. Don't think it actually touched down here, but it was right above our house. Our roof is ripped apart (down to wood), lost 1.5 trees, 1/3 fence gone. We were in closet and all the sudden we heard things ripping apart and hitting house. No power. We are all safe." I didn't realize until later that this was a completely different tornado.
I went over to our house and packed up stuff for us all to spend the night at the Forbes' house. I worried about staying in our house and Taylor waking up the next morning, getting out of bed, and walking out in the hallway with all the glass. Plus, I just felt better that we were all together. I didn't sleep at all that night, and I don't think the Forbes slept much either. Their daughter, Megan, had started earlier that evening to complain about her throat hurting, and Miranda was concerned that she might have strep throat. Megan was restless all night, poor thing. Every time I would doze off, something would wake me up, and then my mind would just start racing thinking about everything that had occured that night. I was sleeping in the recliner, and Jared was on the couch. At one point, I started crying.. just so many mixed emotions- fear, exhaustion, relief, gratitude. The thoughts of how much worse it could have been for us were starting to creep in. What if Jared had been driving home when this hit? What if the tornado had been moved just a little to the left? Our house would have been wiped out, too. Jared heard me crying and had me come lie down by him. He told me not to think about the "what if's." So, I pushed that out of my head and tried to focus on how grateful I was that we were all safe.
There was a police officer driving through the neighborhood all night, and I could see his spotlight everytime as he drove by. I got up at one point and looked out the window. There was a police car parked outside of the house where the lady died. I was so grateful that the firemen had reached that lady first and were the ones to pronounce her dead. I just don't know how I could have done that. As a nurse, I'm trained to do everything that I possibly can to try to save someone, but in a disaster situation, everything changes. You are taught if someone isn't breathing and they don't have a pulse, they're dead. That's it. No CPR. Nothing. Move on. You have to try to save the greatest number of people that you can, and you can't focus all of your efforts on one person. I never even saw the lady. Once Nathan told me the firemen had said she was dead, I didn't even look for her. Again, I just don't know how I could have been the one to pronounce her dead, so grateful that I was not put in that position.
We had been lucky to get in touch with family to let them know we were okay because that night cell phone service became very sparse. Everyone turned their cell phones off before they went to bed so their batteries wouldn't run down. I was still afraid more bad weather might come that night, and someone would be trying to get in touch with us. We had no radio and no tornado sirens to warn us, so I left my phone on. By halfway through the night, my battery was already running low, so I did end up turning it off. We knew our power would be out for a while, but I thought,"Well, we can just go stay at my mom's. I'm sure she will get power back soon."
The next morning, Nathan realized he could get the radio on his mp3 player. I'll never forget when he told us the death toll was up to around 120 in Alabama. I was in disbelief. I mean when tornadoes hit you expect maybe 20 deaths but nothing to this magnitude. We learned there had been tornadoes in Cullman and Tuscaloosa as well. I worried about all of my friends in Tuscaloosa. We learned that all of Madison County was out of power, and it was expected to stay that way for at least 5 days. I remembered on Tuesday, just two days before, Nathan had gone home teaching and came home and told us that the Capps knew someone who worked for the National Weather Service, and they had said that it was going to be bad, that they hadn't seen anything like this in 20-30 years. I had been so quick to dismiss that comment. I have lived in Alabama all my life. I've heard threats of tornadoes so many times, and I've seen damage from tornadoes (I remember driving through Anderson Hills with my dad the last time it was hit by a tornado), but I've never personally been affected by a tornado like this. It's one of those things that you never think is going to happen to you. I never even would have fathomed the amount of destruction that was done in Alabama and the other southern states that day.
As Miranda and I got the girls breakfast, the guys went out to take pictures and survey the damage of our houses and the neighborhood.
When I went back to the house that night to pack up clothes to spend the night at the Forbes', I heard water dripping in the garage, but of course, it was dark, and I couldn't tell where it was coming from or what the damage was. Obviously, water was coming in where the roof was exposed down to the wood.
There was all kinds of debris in our yard. Shingles, fence posts, glass, siding, Christmas ornaments, dry wall, etc. There was even a large piece of metal shoved up under the front of Jared's car which we realized later was part of the BP gas station probably 1.5 miles away.
A 2x4 went through the spare bedroom window. The glass wasn't just broken, but the frame around it was really messed up as well.
This is what Jared found the next morning. We figured out where the water was dripping from.
Our fence was completely knocked down all the way around.
This was the most devastating part to Taylor! Her swing set had been destroyed! The girls also had one of those plastic outdoor playhouses. I didn't even realize until maybe a week later that it was gone, not a single piece of it to be found.
This is what our house looks like all over. Just all kinds of dirt and debris stuck all over it. Our insurance is going to pay to have the house pressure washed. Thank goodness. I can't imagine trying to get all of this off myself!
This appears to be the roof of someone's shed that landed in our backyard, and it didn't just land in our backyard. It was driven about 3 feet into the ground. We're still not exactly sure how we're going to get all of that out. All of the houses in this picture have now been bulldozed except for the one on the far right.
Bella's birthday was the day after the tornado. Luckily, she's only 2, and it wasn't a big deal that we weren't able to get together with all of the family to celebrate. She didn't even know the difference. When we ate breakfast, Miranda put some whipped cream in her cereal and then stuck a candle in it. She was so excited when we started to sing Happy Birthday to her! Last year for her birthday, my mom gave her a toy birthday cake where the candles light up and you can pretend to blow them out. She's had a lot of practice, so she knew exactly what to do. She actually waited until we finished singing and blew the candle right out!
After about an hour of walking around and taking pictures, the guys finally came back. We gathered up the girls and all took a walk around the neighborhood. As you can see, Jared is wearing a sweatshirt. The weather was cool, but the sun was out in full force.
As we walked around, we ran into volunteer firemen, and we questioned them about all the damage that had been done. Initially, we had heard rumors that the Publix and Redstone Federal Credit Union had been wiped out. Nooo! Not Publix! The Publix and RFCU were fine (although RFCU is still not open and I'm not sure why). Only the Sur-Sav and the old Piggly Wiggly were destroyed. They told us that all of the neighborhoods over by Sparkman High School were destroyed. I was thinking about the neighborhoods down Jeff Rd, but I guess maybe they were talking about Anderson Hills. We also kept hearing a lot about Yarbrough Rd, which sounded familiar, but I couldn't quite place where that was.
This house is just as you come around the curve of the road. It's 3 houses down from the Forbes. The house next to that was completely wiped down to the foundation. That is the house where the grandmother died. The house on the other side of it was still standing (although it has now been bull dozed), and the house next to that one was wiped down to the foundation as well. Can you imagine being in the house left standing between two houses wiped completely down to the foundation? Part of the amazing nature of a tornado, how they are so hit and miss.
A more close up picture of that house.
Later that night, the police had propped up the front door to this house and marked "1F" on it for one fatality.
I imagine the layout of this house being a lot like ours with a big open living room area, so the ceiling just caved in.
You couldn't even walk down the road to the other side of Old Eli because so much debris was blocking the road. We ended up having to turn around and go back towards Bollweevil. As we were walking, someone came by and told us that they were cooking food and giving it out where Bollweevil and Ginnery Row meet. We walked over there and found that some neighbors had organized a spot where they were grilling food that they knew would go bad and serving it to everyone. They also had a generator hooked up where people could charge their cell phones.
We got something to eat, and later Jared brought back some hot dogs and buns that we had that they could give to others.
This picture was taken from Bollweevil looking towards Ginnery Row. There were pine trees down everywhere, and the smell of pine was so strong.
Jared's Traeger grill has become one of his most valued possessions. However, we couldn't use it without power. Luckily, we still have a charcoal grill. Jared ran to Publix and was able to get charcoal and ice so we could store as much of our food as possible in coolers. Over the next week, Jared was pretty much our personal chef.
Of course, I couldn't bake a cake for Bella's birthday, but leave it to Miranda to save the day! She took some chocolate chip cookies to make the "crust," then poured very soft ice cream on top, and then sprinkled cookie crumbs on top. It was so good!
We sang Happy Birthday to her for a 2nd time. We actually ended up singing to her for a 3rd time because later we went inside to open presents, and I had to light candles so we could see. I put the presents in front of her to open them, but after seeing the candles, she waited until we sung to her again... haha
We had been told that there was a dusk to dawn curfew in effect. As the sun started to go down, we used the Forbes fire pit to make a fire. Just as Jared was starting the fire, two policemen started walking down the road towards us. They walked up the driveway, and I was just waiting for them to get onto us for building a fire in the driveway and to tell us that we needed to get inside for curfew, but no, they chatted with us for a while and were very friendly. They told us that they would be walking around the neighborhood all night to protect us from looters. They talked with us about everything that had occurred, and one of the police officers talked to us about how everyone is so desensitized to bad weather. He said, "Everytime there is bad weather, the meteorologists are telling us how we need to have our weather radios and we need to have a safe place, and they make a big deal out of it. They are doing what they are supposed to be doing, but people hear it so much that when something like this actually happens people aren't prepared," and it's so true. We weren't prepared. We really could have used some batteries and an operating radio, more flashlights, some extra gas(since the power was out, initially gas stations couldn't pump gas and everyone was in a panic to get gas.), etc.
The camp fires became a tradition. We had one every night while the power was out.
That night I decided that we would stay the night at our house. Even though there was glass in the living room and hallway, we could still sleep in our rooms. I had to work on Friday, so I needed to try to actually get some sleep that night. Before we put the girls in bed, we made sure their shoes were in their room and told Taylor to make sure to put her shoes on before she left her room in the morning. Bella has a crib tent so she can't get out of her bed until we let her out anyway.
(This post is taking so long that I will have to go ahead and post it and do a part II post later!)
5 comments:
Can't tell you how many times I teared up while reading this. i love you guys so much.
I had always heard when the going get tough, the tough get going. You definitely had some tough stuff going on and handled it better than most. So very proud of you and all you have managed both before, during and after. Thanks for sharing and helping the rest of us to keep things in perspective.
So glad you guys are ok! I was completely overwhelmed with gratitude and fear and love for you and your family. Such an amazing story!
Wow, that was amazing and sad all at the same time. I am SO glad you and your family are okay. I hope you'll write part II soon!
I admire your strength. Our hearts go out to you, your family, and surrounding neighbors.
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