Twisters

I live in what is commonly known as tornado alley. I've seen tornadoes from as little as half a mile away, but fortunately I've not had to experience firsthand the devastation of a large funnel. In May 2011 many people in Oklahoma were affected by several outbreaks of twisters.  People lost their lives and many injuries ensued along with widespread property damage.

 On May 24, 2011 my wife was at work and my mother-in-law and I were home watching the weather. We have a scanner that allows us to listen to the local storm spotters. We heard them talking about damage to the Canadian campground at Canton Lake, about 20 miles SW of us.



These pictures were taken at Canadian campgrounds 3 weeks before the damage.

Yours truly & My Wife "Cheri"

 Notice all of the trees.

Cheri and her cousin Marla

Canadian campgrounds aftermath

The rebuilding is underway.

I have included a video that was taken by my friend Danny Giager.

In a few minutes they were talking about damage just southwest of Fairview, my hometown.
We soon saw this funnel from our West windows.

My mother-in-law put my full face street bike helmet on me and I backed into the reinforced shower. She went into the cellar. That tornado actually lifted up and dissipated just southwest of town. PTL

I like to end each post with something upbeat. I hope this doesn't detract from the seriousness of this disaster.

A family had twin boys whose only resemblance to each other was their looks. If one felt it was too hot, the other thought it was too cold. If one said the TV was too loud, the other claimed the volume needed to be turned up. Opposite in every way, one was an eternal optimist, the other a doom and gloom pessimist. Just to see what would happen, on the twins’ birthday their father loaded the pessimist’s room with every imaginable toy and game. The optimist’s room he loaded with horse manure. That night the father passed by the pessimist’s room and found him sitting amid his new gifts crying bitterly. ‘Why are you crying?’ the father asked. ‘Because my friends will be jealous, I’ll have to read all these instructions before I can do anything with this stuff, I’ll constantly need batteries, and my toys will eventually get broken,’ answered the pessimist twin. Passing the optimist twin’s room, the fatherfound him dancing for joy in the pile of manure. ‘What are you so happy about?’ he asked. To which his optimist twin replied, ‘There’s got to be a pony in here somewhere!’

Much love, Dennis