I left work around 5:00pm and had no idea what the night had in store. It began around 8:00pm when some of the first reports of Tornado Warnings began and of course the town warning sirens began to blare. We gathered our girls up and followed the direction of the local news station in staying in a centrally located room without windows.
This is the second time since we moved to Missouri that our girls have been woken up late at night at the sounds of sirens and a news broadcast of immanent danger. Our girls actually had fun staying up with us watching the news and gathering our emergency supplies. Despite the fact that we were in the direct path of the multi-wave storm we only experienced a ton of rain and wind. We saw no hail and no twisters. However, we were very lucky as indicated by the following news story obtained from the local paper, News-Leader.
January 8, 2008
35 tornadoes in five waves of storms ripped through southwest Missouri, tearing the roof off a school in the town of Republic, collapsing several buildings in Springfield and destroying dozens of homes in neighboring counties, according to emergency management officials. In downtown Springfield, a community of 152,000, an F-1 tornado packing 100 mph winds collapsed two buildings and knocked down trees and signs around 3 a.m. Tuesday.Springfield City Utilities crews quickly restored power to about 10,000 customers who lost electricity from downed power lines.The twisters also hit a mobile home park south of Monett and damaged homes and a school roof in Republic before slamming into Strafford and touching down near Marshfield.
During the most intense times of the storm I kept looking out over the horizon for a dreaded funnel cloud but fortunate for us I never found one. There have been many interesting experiences that our family has had since moving to the Show Me State, this certainly is one of them.
Mental Note: loud sirens at night that wake you up is a sign to take cover, to take cover quickly
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