Our Tornado Story
as told by Judy
I had laid down to take a nap Friday
evening and was awakened by the sound of the siren. I went out to the
living room and asked Ed if we were going to the basement. He was
getting Barney (our African Grey parrot) in his cage and said to me in an
urgent voice, "Absolutely." Ed was watching TV and the meteorologist
was giving a warning with urgency in his voice, saying very loudly, "This is
a tornado EMERGENCY! If you live in Greensburg or south of Greensburg,
get in your basement or shelter NOW!" (The urgent warning of the
meteorologist and the siren saved our lives.) At that point we
took Barney and went to the basement. Ed got some chairs and we
positioned the chairs back in a corner near our washer and dryer away from
the basement window. We were watching our little TV in the basement
and the news kept us informed how many minutes away the tornado was from
Greensburg. At some point, when we had around 20 minutes, I remembered
that we had some cash upstairs. I said to Ed, "Do you suppose we
oughta go upstairs and get that cash?" Ed said emphatically, "YES!"
So we ran upstairs and got the cash and brought it to the basement. As
we sat huddled together we continued to watch the coverage on TV and they
continued to inform us exactly how many minutes away the tornado was from
Greensburg. First we heard real bad hail and Ed commented about how
terrible hail damage is to vehicles. Then on TV, they said you have
two minutes. Right after that warning, our electricity went out and we
could hear the powerful wind. It broke out the south basement windows.
As Ed and I held each other tightly with our heads down together we could
hear the wood splintering and glass breaking upstairs and the sound of loud
thuds as furniture items crashed to the floor. We could feel the force
of the wind. Each time we heard these splintering and breaking sounds
we uttered moans of despair because we knew each time we heard this it
was a major part of our home being blown away. It lasted an incredibly
long time. I said to Ed, "Aren't tornados only supposed to last four
or five minutes?" He replied, "I thought so." But it continued.
We waited there until it was calm.
Our neighbors, Cody and Michelle Mayse,
came to our north basement window with a flashlight and asked if we were
alive and in there. We said yes. Michelle said, "It's gone.
It's all gone." Then Ed and I made our way up the basement stairs and
had to shove things away from the door to enter the kitchen. We were
able to walk around on our main floor. With flashlights we could see
our scrambled belongings and mud and dirt on the walls. But we could
also see that there were some things in the house that were still o.k.
We walked to the front room and Ed shone the light on the grandfather clock
that was standing there in perfect condition and still running. We
went to our bedroom, which was mostly in shambles. There were still a
few items standing and in good condition. I shone a flashlight at a
picture that hung above our bed. The tiger picture had been ripped out
but the frame was hanging there perfectly. We made our way outside.
I think we went out the back door. Our neighbor, Evon, and some of her
family were standing outside. We stood in disbelief as we looked
around. We continued to say. "This is unbelievable. What
are we going to do?" Evon said, "We could go sit on my front porch,
but I don't have one." Ed could go into our front door and retrieved
some coats from our closet, one for Evon and one for each of us.
Evon's family found a way to get her out by way of the alley and they left
to go to safety. Ed and I went out to Bay Street. As we wandered
in a zombie daze we continued to find some of our other neighbors.
Since it was completely dark, when we would see shadows of people we would
say "Who are you?" Each time we heard a person say their name, we
would hug them and say "Thank God you're alive!" Still in disbelief,
looking out we could not see the water tower that we could normally see from
our home. And we said, "Even the water tower is gone." All we
could see were sprigs of broken trees. A huge tree in our front yard
was thrown across Ed's work pickup and the root system was on top of the
ground. My Tracker and Ed's red pickup were in shambles and I said to
Ed, "I guess hail damage is the least of our worries." We
then decided we must walk down Bay Street to continue to see and try to
believe what had happened. As we walked down Bay, there was rubble
everywhere. We could not recognize what street we were on, it was so
disorienting. We walked to the end of Bay Street where four or five
semis were strewn around and one was on top of another one. We
realized this must be C-Mart! We were at highway 54. We knew it
was the highway because of the marking. We continued to walk down the
highway to witness the devastation. We ran into Tracy Little and her
baby who did not know where her parents were. Then she walked with us.
While we were walking, we met her uncle Ryan Jack who told her they had
found her parents and they were ok. She then went with Ryan and we
went on down the highway. We noticed the Sirois' home was
destroyed. It was a big brick building that had formerly been a
church. We continued to walk and came upon a shambled building that we
identified as the Kwik Shop. We continued to walk until we reached the
corner of Main and the highway. Stopping at that corner we knew that
was the location of the Kiowa County Historical Museum. As we looked
up, that beautiful old historical building was a pile of bricks. Ed
and I stood there for several minutes lamenting the amount of dedicated work
and time and effort that so many people, especially Ed, had contributed to
make the museum an excellent example of the history of Kiowa County.
We continued to walk down main, still in disbelief that every building was a
pile of rubble. It was difficult to recognize the buildings.
When we stood in front of a building, we said, "That must be Greensburg High
School." We ran into Cory and Gene West who were on their way to the
home of Ruth West, Gene's mother to see if she was still alive. (Later at
the Haviland shelter, we did see Ruth). We turned around to go back
north because we couldn't walk west back to our street because of the rubble
in the streets. We continued to walk until we got back to the highway.
We went back down the highway until we got back to Bay Street. We
turned south onto Bay still finding it very difficult to recognize the
streets. We felt very lost and disoriented. As we walked back
down Bay Street we would say, "That must be so-and-so's house" until we
found 409 S. Bay again. Since we could walk on our main floor and our
basement is what had saved us, we thought we could just stay in our basement
that night. We went upstairs and got pillows from the bedroom and a
few other items and took those to the basement.
Suddenly, flashlight and voices
appeared in our south window yelling "Is anyone there? Are
you OK?" We replied, "Yes we're ok. We're alive." I said
that we thought we could just stay in our basement tonight. The men
identified themselves as Garden City Fire Department. They said,
"Ma'am, have you seen your house?" And I said, "Well, yes." They
told Ed that it was a very good possibility that it could collapse in on us.
They said, "Ma'am you are not staying in this house tonight." They
instructed us to go to the highway and get on a school bus that would take
us to a shelter. We asked if we could take our parrot and they said
yes. We got a blanket to cover Barney's cage. The men from the
Garden City Fire Department escorted us out. As we left the front
door, Ed told those gentlemen to wipe their feet so they wouldn't get the
carpet dirty. We all had a good laugh. As we turned back, Ed
also said, "I guess we won't need to lock the door." There we were,
refugees, walking down Bay Street, Ed carrying the parrot, me carrying my
little sack of things I had saved-my purse and other miscellaneous items.
At the highway we got on a Mullinville school bus. On the bus radio,
they told the driver to go to the hospital to pick up some patients needing
to go to Hutch hospital. So that bus proceeded to the hospital to pick
up the patients. Ed and I informed them that we didn't want to go to
Hutch, but we wanted to go to the Haviland shelter. The kind firemen
with much difficulty got the four patients loaded. They were
accompanied by two nurses. As we drove down the street back to the
highway, the nurses were just shocked at the damage. They took us to
the Dillon's parking lot, where we then loaded onto the Bucklin school bus.
On entering the bus, I noticed the driver was Mr. Kohlman, the Bucklin
principal. He said, "Well, hello, Judy." We waited for awhile
until a few other people boarded, one of whom was Helen, our church
secretary. We were so happy to see that she was alive. At that
point we could observe ambulances and school buses that had come to our aid
from many counties in Kansas. Then we went to Haviland. Arriving
at the shelter at the Haviland High School gym we were asked to register and
were given bottles of water. At the shelter we were able to see
several of our friends and neighbors. Without cell service, it was
impossible to get word to our daughters that we were ok. A friend from
Inman finally contacted Heather by phone at about four in the morning.
Saturday morning we went to the home of Jeff Blattner in Haviland where we
could call our daughter from his land phone. We made arrangements that
Heather would meet us in Kinsley and take us safely to Hugoton.
From Hugoton, we watched the
television coverage and learned that residents could return to Greensburg on
Monday. Heather, Rachel, Ed and I left at 5 in the morning so that we
would be in Greensburg early. We waited in line to go through the
check points for about an hour and a half. We were cleared and went to
see our devastated home. The girls were in shock and Ed and I
commented that it looked so much worse than it did that night. We
walked through and around the house to assess the damage. A few hours
later Brad and Shawn arrived. We worked to retrieve our most precious
items first. We were very fortunate as most of the main floor was
still standing and we were able to retrieve many items. The
grandfather clock was still keeping correct time. We walked around the
town to see a few significant places. We walked past the water
tower, Big Well and the high school. We also went to see the church.
It was almost completely demolished except for the statue of St. Joseph and
the cross in the front of the church. The bell tower was also still
standing. I rode back to our house in a motor carrier inspector's
vehicle while Heather and Rachel walked around town a bit more to see the
grade school and the hospital. The next two days, Ed, Brad, and Shawn
retrieved the remainder of all the salvageable items, including some
furniture, and stored them in Dodge City at a friend's storage building.
Our plans as of now are to secure a
FEMA trailer as soon as they are available and begin to rebuild our home.
We are grateful for everyone who has offered help. At this point
continued prayer is most welcome. When we know what our specific needs
are, we will let our friends and family know how they can help. Thank
you all so much for your love, support, and prayers.
pictures added
March 2008 at the bottom of the page!
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