Tornado Alley

OkieG · May 10, 2003

After 11 years in Oklahoma, I saw my first "live" tormado. The Thursday afternoon tornado missed our house by 1/4 mile, so the view was up close and personal. Both family and house are fine.

The kids and I walked to friends' homes in the development next to ours and found they didn't fare as well. All the family members are OK.

OkieG

OkieG · May 10, 2003

Other friends are their next door neighbors. Here's a shot from the driveway of their two story home.

OkieG

RBManufacturing · May 10, 2003

OkieG,
Glad to see you and yours are o.k. Tragic about your
neighbors. We had a tornado miss our place by 6 houses.
(about 1 1/2 blocks.) One of the houses it hit belongs to a
good friend of mine. Totaled his place. He was not at home at
the time. HE WAS OUT TORNADO CHASING!!! Ironic. He had
a camera and was hoping to get pictures. He got alot of
pictures, but they were all of his house. I saw our tornado
up close also. When I could see a pickup bed liner, and a
light pole, with wires still attached, coming my way, I ran
for cover. I now have a pickup bed liner with a few scratches
that landed in my neighbors yard. Never saw the light pole again.
Take care, the season is just starting. Rick

Bird · May 10, 2003

Yep, my old home state's been hit really hard the last two days. Thank goodness no one was killed. Glad you and yours survived OK. I got to see a tornado close enough to be a terrifying experience once myself, but fortunately it turned before it got to us.

BillG_in_TX · May 10, 2003

George & Rick,

Happy to hear that you both dodged the storms, but that's way too close for any degree of comfort. I saw some news footage of people in Moore with above-ground "safe rooms" that rode out the storm without injury. Makes that "safe house" that Patrick is building look all the more attractive.

My daughter and her family live in Tulsa, and I was up until the wee hours watching that storm last night that took the interstate up from OKC. It appeared to go right through Stroud and dancce's tractor dealership. I hope he fared as well as you did.

Chuck52 · May 10, 2003

We're well north of the areas hit in Missouri, but we also had some wind damage north of us in the last couple of days. Daughter, SIL and two grandbabies live in a trailer, and whenever something looks to be coming their way she brings the babies home to momma. They're closing on a partial earth contact home in a little hollow next month. I guess we might not be seeing the babies quite so often during stormy weather!

Chuck

RobertN · May 10, 2003

I was discussing this with my Taxonomy teacher a week or two ago, while we looked at a world relief map. Tornadoes happen in other places; we had some funnel clouds over Sacramento Ca on Thursday afternoon. A small tornado touched down on my Grandfathers property about 12 years ago; the property is outside of Sacramento.

But, you never hear of extremes in tornadoes like in "Tornado Alley". That corridor north/south from the Gulf of Mexico up through Canada, and sided with mountian ranges is not seen anywhere else. It is unique to that geography.

em14 · May 11, 2003

OkieG,
I'm glad you and your family are OK. I've been around a few of those things and they awesome ... such force will make a believer out of anyone ... I have lived in Kansas and Tennesse where these things are to common for me ... take care.
Leo