Saturday May 21st was a typical Spring day - our Spring season here in Missouri is full of rain, sun and tornadoes. Every year there is tornadic activity. Our local news stations show a color radar of our section of the country they call "The Four States" because we are in the far southwest corner of Missouri. The four states include Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Missouri. So when it looks stormy, we tune into a local tv station and watch the news tape traveling across the bottom of the screen to see if your county is included in the bad weather prediction which could be "Severe Thunderstorms" "Thunderstorm Watch" "Tornado Warning" or "Tornado Watch". Well on this day there were storms predicted. We did get rain throughout the night and into the next day, Sunday, May 22.
Sunday morning, raining and storm warnings. Had to do the general chores - sweeping, dishes, feeding birds, laundry etc. Pulled weeds, tilled the garden and planted the young tomato plants, planted the Dill, the pickling cucumbers and the spaghetti squash. It began to rain again. Went inside, prepared dinner and got a phone call. It was about 4:00pm. The phone call was from my riding friend, Jeannie. She was at Freeman Hospital and had been there since yesterday. She had fallen off her horse and fractured her wrist. She was waiting for her husband to come and get her to take her home. He was still at work. I told her I would come get her, bring her home and help settle her in. She thought about it for a few minutes, changing her mind several times and finally decided she would wait for her husband. Freeman Hospital is located about 2 blocks away from St. John's Hospital - their parking lots touch each other.
I sat down to watch a program on tv and it was interrupted by local news/weather alert. There were tornadoes sighted touching down in several locations across the Four States. The radar showed the storms with tornadic activity headed west from Kansas towards Missouri and especially our area which includes Carthage, Diamond, Joplin, Duequene, Webb City and Carterville.
As I was watching they showed a view of downtown Joplin which was from a camera located on a tower near St. John's Hospital. The weatherman is watching the skies and what looks like as a "squall" which is a heavy downpour coming out of some black clouds. Then all of a sudden the weatherman and his crew start yellin' " tornado, tornado touchin' down in Joplin, take cover, Oh My God, tornado, tornado touchin' down, we are seein' debris - Oh My God." Then the camera goes black and so does the connection - silence!!!!! such scary silence.
Well our godson, JonBoy, lives in Joplin, works at night as a Sheriff and is asleep right now. I call him, woke him up. He answered saying, "Hi Mom, I heard the sirens." I yell, "Jon take cover, a tornado is touchin' down in Joplin, call me back." We hang up. And then I wait. I am watching the television, changin' channels to the other local channels - no one had any info except that there is a report of a tornado has touched down in Joplin and debris was sighted. Debris is whatever is torn up on the ground is in the air, chairs, roofs, cars, metal, siding, roofing tiles, you name it. Then the reports starting comin' in - major touchdown in Joplin, St. John's Hospital was hit and many homes destroyed plus major stores on Rangeline Blvd, which is the main center of Joplin.
The phone rings, Pat and I are in the living room watching the reports. JonBoy is calling to tell us he is okay. The tornado hit within a few blocks of his apt. He is headed out to help and find his friends. Our hearts sunk - the rain was fallin' hard here at the ranch. We go outside in the barn and stand in the doorway to see the heavy rain in the pasture. As we are standing there, the rain lightens up. I spot a big flock of birds way up high in the sky. Can't make out what kind of birds, and they seemed to be playing in the thermals like big birds do. We watch this huge flock of birds, trying to figure out this strange sighting as birds don't do this when it is raining.
As we watched the flock of birds gets lower and lower and then.........big pieces of plywood, 12 ft sections of metal siding, thousands of broken roof tiles start raining down on our ranch. Those weren't birds, they were pieces of peoples houses and trailers and buildings. Then papers, wet and shredded started falling along with rubber gloves, file folders - our hears sunk - tears in our eyes - the deadly silence was horrific as we watched evidence of shredded lives float down onto our pastures. Some of it was from Joplin High School, cheerleading files, folders, bits and pieces of books. Then remnants of medical files and reports floated down, all rain soaked and torn. We just stood there in awe and not knowing what to do. More wire and air ducts and papers and Taco Bell sacks and insulation ---all coming out of the sky----drifting down gently----everything coming down in deadly silence.
What do we do? We just stand there....dazed! Then more alerts are coming over our weather radio (everyone is encouraged to have one out here) with threats of more tornadoes and severe thunderstorms. We call JonBoy again - he says, "Mom you can't believe what has happened, it looks like a war zone. I have been pullin' people out of piles of destruction, got to go, I'll call later." Jonboy called us later to say he found most of his friends and there are now 28 people staying in his little 2 bedroom apt tonight. They have gone out and found some food which was difficult because there is so much debris, you can't go down most streets and a lot of the fast food places are destroyed including Walmart.
Here we are 27 miles away, not knowing what to do. The local stations are telling folks to stay home, all emergency crews are there and more arriving from 5 different states. I get a phone call from my niece is in Oklahoma visiting her mom. She lives in Calif. She is an emergency room nurse in the Navy. She jumped in her truck and was on her way to Joplin (4 hrs drive) and worked for the next 2 days with no sleep.
You feel powerless, helpless, not knowing what to do. People wandered around town in Carthage in a daze. I went to Walmart and it was so very crowded with people filling shopping baskets with blankets, paper plates, plastic ware, toilet paper and paper towels, tents etc. The man is front of me bought 20 $50 gift cards to hand out to folks. Walmart was more crowded then I have ever seen it at any time of the year.
For the next three days we lived under threats and sightings of tornadoes, afraid to leave our homes and checking in with people who were on the emergency crews (friends) asking what we could do. They said, please stay away and stay home. People coming to Joplin
wanting to help were just getting in the way of the rescuers trying to find people trapped in the destruction.
A local radio station immediately started taking calls from anyone and trying to answer questions - "We need cots, we need gloves to go through wreckage" Someone else would call in saying they own a store and have hundreds of gloves to donate. On and on and on. Calls coming in looking for relatives and friends, leaving phone number and locations. This went on for 1 month. Finally there were locations set up to reunite people and pets. There were over 3000 pets found and taken to the shelter to hopefully be reunited with their loving owners. All but 600 were reunited and they found new homes.
I could go on and on about the volunteers, donations that came in and continue to come in. All this does is remind us of a beautiful country we live in - no matter what the newspapers and news programs try and convince us of.
Today, August 13, 2011 almost 3 months later most of the debris from the almost 2 mile wide and 7 mile long destruction is removed. Homes are being rebuilt, St. John's Hospital is empty but has temp facilities set up and it will rebuild. The high school and elementary school have temporary locations in empty buildings and are incredible. All the children have and will receive book bags with all the supplies they need. The high school students are all receiving IPADS free.
My friend Jeannie, was in Freeman Hospital at the beginning of all this. Her husband had just arrived to pick her up when nurses ran into the room she was in and immediately moved her and her husband into the hallway with hundreds of other hospital beds filled with patients and people on crutches etc.
They were unharmed. If I had gone into town to pick her up, I would have been right at the location where the tornado touched down. When we figured it out - it took our breaths away. It was not my time to go. I have other tasks to do on this earth for Him.
I have so much to be thankful for. This is only a strong reminder.
Thank you for visiting my blog today. Please come back as I love to share.
FARMERS HOME REMEDIES - Bee Stings, Cuts and Bruise
Bee Sting - A slice of onion applied to a bee sting will take the pain away.
Cuts and Bruises - To cuts and bruises make an ice pack to keep on hand. Fill a zip lock type sandwich bag with 2 cups of water and 1/3 cup of rubbing alcohol. Zip shut and place in freezer. The slush type ice that forms will mold to most parts of the body when placed on the cut or bruise and it will bring relief.
MOM MARGE'S VEGETABLE CASSEROLE - My step Mom, Marge Tuthill (great cook)
1 can green beans - drained
1 can white corn - drained
1 can water chestnuts - drained and chopped
1 cup chopped onions
1 cup sour cream
1 cup cheddar cheese grated
1 can cream of celery soup
1 tube of Ritz Crackers
1 stick of butter chopped
Mix together and top with tube of crushed Ritz crackers
Add butter on top
Bake 45 mins at 350 deg. ENJOY!!
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