Tornado

Never in my life did I ever, ever think that the title of this blog would ever say, "Tornado".

It does...it happened.  We were directly affected, but...by the grace of God:  We are uninjured.  We are safe.  We did not sustain major damage to our home.  We did not lose anything of value.

We were lucky.

Many around us, in fact, less than 60 feet away, are dealing with extraordinary situations tonight and for the coming weeks and months.

Let's talk about this weather.

First off, during the day on Friday, the National Weather Service put out a Tornado Watch, which means that conditions are favorable for tornadoes.  They put out watches all the time, and while they are good for awareness, it most certainly does not mean that you will encounter a tornado.

It was kinda a weird day on Friday.  Rainy in the morning, then clearing, then warming at night.  We had Texas Roadhouse for dinner and then headed back to the house.  While in TR, I was watching a pretty intense line of thunderstorms roll into our area.  They had a pretty strong signature of wind and hail, but really didn't have the signs that pointed to tornadoes, especially tornadoes of the magnitude we received.

At about 745PM, the sirens went off for a Tornado Warning, meaning that a tornado was spotted OR the weather guys at the NWS were "seeing" rotation on the radar.  Emmy and the boys calmly went downstairs and I pulled up the radar and stood out front of the house, watching and listening.

What I saw on the radar was not good.  Was not something I wanted to see, however, when looking at it frame-by-frame, I just thought, it's got to be going north of us.

Here's what I saw:

So, quick lesson.  This is the radar velocity, which used the radar at the STL Airport.  Basically, what you are seeing is wind.  Blues and greens is wind toward the radar, red is away and purple it can't figure it out.  Now, the blue circle is my location on the front porch.  The darkish blue color your see directly to my southwest is the tornado.  Colors in royal blue range so winds that are about 110 mph.  About this time, I started seeing what looked like a wall of rain heading right toward our front porch.  I had seen this before and wasn't too alarmed.  It was moving pretty quickly, but for the most part, I just though, hmm, rain moving in...I did hear whooshing sounds, almost like a big wave crashing / rolling when your at the beach. I watched it from the front porch until it was about 1 street over.  Then the power went out. I never saw a funnel.

I walked downstairs and the boys and Mommy were hanging out with candles and such.  I said, hey might be some wind.  No sooner did I say that and we heard the chairs on our deck moving around significantly.  Sliding, falling, etc.  Then our ears started to pop. Emmy said, "That's a sign right?".  I said, "Yes." Aidan said his ears were popping too.  Allie was freaked out, took us about 3 calls to get her to come to us.  At that time, we went into the little closet, shut the door and that was it.  The boys were scared but we were calm.  Mommy asked Aidan if he wanted to say a prayer, he did, and we did.  One Our Father and one Hail Mary.  Then Aidan asked if he could say his own prayer.  He did, silently.  All the time, we heard creaking and more sliding chairs and I was watching on my phone the radar.  It was about this point that someone had confirmed it was a tornado.  We waited a minute or two...and then we came out.

The scariest thing for me was the moment before looking out of the basement window.  What was I going to see?  Our roof?  Our patio furniture?  All the trees behind our house gone?

Well, I saw lots of things.  Basically almost all the contents of our deck down in the yard.  The boys play house thrown about 20 feet towards the SOUTH (remember the tornado was coming from the SW, this indicated rotation to me).

I walked upstairs and out front in the pouring rain to assess damage.

First most disturbing...the roof above.  Ripped up shingles.

Flashing pulled back and twisted.

(Sorry, it was raining)

That was the extent of the damage to us...like I said. We were lucky.

My neighbor told me to go down the street.  I first was worried the people were injured after what I saw...

This is what's left of a pull behind camper.  I have more pics later...it was about 5 houses to the south of us. 

It rained and stormed all night Friday, with no power, and there wasn't much I could do.  No tarping or anything like that. Just hunker down in the dark and we all slept in the living room :(

The next morning I got up early to get tarps and ice and other stuff and on the way to Home Depot I took pictures of the damage. 

This is coming home the "back way" for those who know our path. That is Whitmoor Gated Community on the right.

Messy tree situation.

This is likely some of the worst damage I was able to see (they closed the roads to the really bad area).

Big tree problems here. 

This was an entire forest, leveled.

Heading back toward home on Towers Rd. 

Looking down Towers at Dingledine...major power lines down. 

This is on Dingledine across from the little cemetery for those who know. 

And this is the Christmas Light guy's backyard and fence. 

Now on Cambridge Crossing at Reddington Oaks, one street over from us. Major damage including a impalement into the two story white house on the right.

Farther up on Cambridge right before you turn down our street.  Significant structure damage, likely EF2.  Also, Emmy pointed out, lots of damage all around.  Statue of Mary....didn't move.

Sorry blurry pic, but this is just before you turn onto our street. 

Making the turn...doesn't look good. 

Heading down street, our old friends the Katz's lived on the house to the right there. 

Looking down the street. Our house is obscured by the rain drop. 

Big tree and car damage about 4 houses down from us. 

Camper, car, pushed, big damage.

I feel terrible for these nice people here...don't know them by name but they always waved hi. 

Next store neighbor.  Only lost 1/2 of Bradford Pear tree.

Our little roof damage.

Closer.

A little flashing "twist"

Looking from the SW.

Looking from the South...tons of crap plastered to the house.

Backyard.

More.

Our poor trees in the back.

Kind of a mess. 

Interesting pic.  Two pieces of siding...both not ours. One is beige the other grey...our siding is tan. 

Looking down the hill.  Something is missing :(

Those three poor trees.  I saved them about 6 years ago when some vines started tightening around them choking them of and almost killing them.

The damage the vines caused a knot in the tree, and it broke right above the knot. :(

I'm sorry trees....'(

Couple storm riders checking things out. 

Lots of leaves and stuff pushed against the house.  Note, you're looking west here...another sign of rotation. 

The deck made it out OK...not alot of problems with exception of the chairs being everywhere. 

Mr. Tornado.  I hope this doesn't scar them for life.

Looking south.  Storm didn't even knock Mike's Weber Grill over!

Another shot of the trees....

Looking south, towards the most damaged area. 

Lots of tree problems.

I mentioned something is missing...hold that thought.

More gaps of trees :(

Shingle up...some water penetrated but not a big deal.

Pretty sizable chuck...God I hope they don't give us just a partial roof repair.

I spent all morning nailing down the tarp.  It's aerospace quality..it ain't going nowhere :)

There was another small spot at the apex of the roof with missing shingles too. 

Now, onto the missing item.  Here is a shot off our deck Saturday Morning.

Thursday night, we had some rain and a rainbow. I took this picture (and others at the end of this post).

Our enormous, beautiful, 100' tall Sycamore tree.  The one that shields us from seeing all the houses...fell.

He moved to the right and is completely uprooted. Very sad.

Let me preface, 100%.  Losing shingles, little trees or big trees is nothing. Nothing.  What people lost in this storm were much worse than we did. It was a terrible destructive storm.  We were without power for 47 and a half hours.  Just horrible weekend.  Only bright side is that it was not 100F outside.   It was unseasonably cool.

Now, this:

Again the camper from down the street.  It was parked on the RIGHT HAND side of the driveway.  The Civic on the LEFT HAND side.  Note there is no big damage to the Civic.  How did they switch places?  It was picked up and thrown across the Honda.  Amazing power..terrifying.

Now to the boys.

We found this in the neighbor's yard...our flashing.  Might as well pose by it!

Almost see the rainbow behind on Thursday.

Beautiful...across our backyard prior to the destruction :(

Thankfully, and truly thankfully, the power is back.  The house isn't damaged much.  We are safe...

Hopefully time will heal those affected by this storm.  I love weather, I do.  I'm all over radar and all that jazz, but this was too close.  It wasn't exciting or exhilarating..it was scary.  I don't want to see this again...cross it off the bucket list. 

Thanks for your concern for us this weekend.  All is OK. 

Have a good night. Let's be done with tornadoes.  Officially an EF3, major tornado.  Our area was EF1 damage.

Ty, Emmy, Aidan and Ethan