in case you were wondering...

Friday, April 29, 2011

Tornado Night

Well, you may have heard about our day and night of storms on Wednesday. It was pretty crazy for us.

The storms started blowing in around 9 am on Wednesday morning. For the third time this year, Mark and I were standing at the window watching the storm blow through the neighborhood, marveling at the strong winds, only to find out later that the rest of the neighborhood was sensibly hiding in their basements. We just don't realize the strength at the time! When it passed over, we walked out to see major trees down on power lines, and heard from neighbors that a tornado had blown through the neighborhood and done a lot of damage. We didn't have power, so we took a walk and were saddened to see lots of homes with trees through their roofs.

But the storms weren't done coming. They kept passing through in waves throughout the day. We decided to spend the day at my parents' house, where they had power. So we grabbed the diaper bag and headed over there for the day. Another strong storm system blew through that afternoon, and we got our car in their garage just a few minutes after the hail started blowing in.

After that wave, there was a break, so Mark and I took advantage of the babysitters and went to go get dinner. On our way over we saw that a tornado had wrecked a few buildings between our houses. While the storm was clear, we thought we'd go back to our house after diner and grab a few things out of the fridge and freezer to try and save them, but on our way over, someone called and told us that the largest of the systems was going to hit our area in 20 minutes.

So we sped around the mountain over to our house, grabbed the contents of the fridge in the dark and got to a neighbors house (where they had power) just in time to hide out in their basement. We spent the next hour there (Simon was still at my parents' house) while the storm raged above us. I think this was the wave where the biggest tornado hit our area, south of us, in Ringgold.

But there was one more wave to come, and we wanted to get back to my parents and Simon before it came through. So we jumped in the car and started to race back around the mountain, only to find that road was closed to flooding. Next we got on the interstate, heading west but keeping our eye on the crazy clouds. When we tried to get off the interstate, the exit ramp was too flooded to drive through, so we had to go to the next exit, wind around on some back roads, and finally made it to my parents' house. I was pretty anxious by then, and the sky was getting more and more threatening by the minute.

Fortunately, though, the next wave passed us without too much incident, and we spent the night in safety. We found a dresser drawer for Simon to sleep in, and he returned the favor by waking us up approximately every 45 minutes.

Over 48 hours out, and we still don't have power to our house, but we are grateful to be safe and with family. 300 dead in the south, and 70 in the Chattanooga area, we know it could have turned out quite differently.