tornado

Yesterday morning a tornado touched down a little over a block from our house, taking out the Asian market (next door to our favorite taco shop), a telephone pole, and a number of trees.

Tragically, a 15 year old girl was killed on the other side of Hwy 412 when a tree fell on her home and crushed her.

Our house and our closest neighbors have no damage, but we were all pretty shaken up.

Here's what happened:

The tornado siren woke me up out of a blissfully deep sleep at 4 am. Liam was sound asleep in his cradle, and Gabe was in such a deep sleep that I had to almost yell his name to wake him up (he normally sleeps through Liam's overnight feedings/diaper changes/crying). At first, the storm didn't sound like anything to really be worried about, and then the siren turned off.

I went downstairs and turned on the news, just to see what Drew Michaels had to say. The screen was filled with a radar closeup of Siloam, with a huge red mass just across the stateline in OK. "If you live in Siloam, seek shelter immediately..." And then the power went out. I ran upstairs and grabbed Liam, and then the wind picked up and it started hailing. Gabe followed me downstairs, grabbed a flashlight, and started walking around the house, looking out the windows, admiring the storm like a crazy man while Liam and I huddled in the pantry. From inside the pantry, I could hear a loud rushing noise, and then it was over.

We all went back to bed; Liam never even woke up.

It wasn't until morning that we realized just how bad it was...

We took some pictures, but our computer seems to have sent them to no-man's land. We'll try to take some more.