Checking my email from Jury Duty, I read a note from Chickpea asking if my parents were okay in tornado-torn Springfield. That's the first I heard that my hometown was apparently blown apart by the forces of nature.
No word from my parents yet on how - if at all - the storm impacted them. But news reports don't put the touchdowns in their neighborhood - several points within a mile or two, but no direct hits.
Apparently, the video store at which I worked in high school didn't survive. The owner was a racist jerk - a fact not included in any of the news reports.
Jody, Tom, Ryan, Shannon, any other Springfield friends - hope all is okay with your people there.
No word from my parents yet on how - if at all - the storm impacted them. But news reports don't put the touchdowns in their neighborhood - several points within a mile or two, but no direct hits.
Apparently, the video store at which I worked in high school didn't survive. The owner was a racist jerk - a fact not included in any of the news reports.
Jody, Tom, Ryan, Shannon, any other Springfield friends - hope all is okay with your people there.
posted by isaacjosephson at 11:38 AM
3 Comments:
Sorry to be the bearer of the news... I hope everyone's well (from what I heard, there were surprisingly few injuries, I think)...
Have fun at jury duty.
No fatalities reported. Two F2 (i.e., wind speeds at 120 mph) tornadoes hit Spfld. on Sunday night around 8:15 CST.
Most of Spfld. was without power on Monday, and a few areas were still without power on Tues. Most schools were closed on Mon. & Tues., as the most of the school buses were damaged.
The first storm hit the southwest side of town - Parkway Pointe, Sherwood (your old neighborhood), Jerome, south Macarthur, and new Stanford overpass (near Wabash curve), and the Bunn Park area. The Barrel Head on Wabash is a total loss.
The second came down on the east side near Bergen Park, Clear Lake Ave. and Dirksen Prkwy areas.
I think your folks live in Cobblestone (far west side - just north of where the first storm came down) also about a mile west of where my sister and brother-in-law live. Kathy & Jeff reported a pressure drop (i.e., ear popping) followed by the sound of a freight train. Their subdivision was generally spared - homes lost some shingles and a few branches were down.
The Wal-Mart seen on National TV is/was Parkway Pointe. Lauren & I were at Target (just south of Wal-Mart) and Toys R US looking at bikes about 2 hours before the storms hit. She turns five next week. During the storm she asked me "Daddy, what's a tornado?"...I tried to relate to something she could understand...., "Honey, it's like the big bad wolf - only a tornado will blow OUR house down." She was a real trooper thru the whole thing.
Sorry for being so long winded.
Thanks for the report, Ryan.
When I talked to my parents yesterday around 8pm, they still did not have heat/electricity. Must have been a cold night.
Post a Comment
<< Home