Dozernut
Veteran Member
- Joined
- Apr 6, 2002
- Messages
- 1,611
- Location
- South Eastern Illinois
- Tractor
- ZD1211, RTV900, LX2610SU and a SVL65 CTL
A storm rolled in on the 15th, I was standing in the yard watching it when I heard the familiar freight train rumble. Then I saw a tornado funnel briefly touch down in the field SW of our house then it lifted back up. The wife and I ran for shelter to ride it out. The twister went over the house and we heard a lot of crashing along with the roaring. It lasted maybe 10 seconds but seemed longer, I guess fear slows down time. After we survived this one we went to survey the damage. It looked like bomb had hit, we had trees and huge limbs down every where. luckily the house and machine shed were spared but the tool shed was speared by a falling branch. The electricity was out, the drive and the road were blocked with fallen trees.
A young Amish man, one of our neighbors, ran to our house to check on us to see if we were unharmed then ran to check on the elderly couple across the road. No one was killed or injured in this storm but there was a lot of property damage with some animals killed. The turkey farm north of us had the roof torn off of one barn and the wall torn out of another. Another neighbor to the east had four sheds destroyed and the poultry and rabbits in them were killed. His house and new garage was left untouched.
We got the generator out and fired it up and plugged in the the refrigerators, freezer and a few fans to fight the summer heat. Camping lanterns provided us with light after dark and the gas grill cooked our meals.
We have been working till dark the last two days cleaning up and have several day more of work. We finally got the power back on late yesterday afternoon and starting to get a semblance of normality to our lives.
The funny thing about this twister is that 7-8 years ago a tornado took out our orchard, we are down to four trees and the orchard was completely untouched. It laid the bridge to the one of the islands on its side, bent the post to the bird house in the orchard and took out trees beside it.
Without electricity and working till dark we have not been able to tell our story until now. A few pictures of some of the damage. The fourth picture is of a large Black Oak that was uprooted The root ball was 10' tall. The Amish came and cut it up and they are going to use it to heat their school house. I have to go now and put some hours in with the chainsaw and the tractor.
A young Amish man, one of our neighbors, ran to our house to check on us to see if we were unharmed then ran to check on the elderly couple across the road. No one was killed or injured in this storm but there was a lot of property damage with some animals killed. The turkey farm north of us had the roof torn off of one barn and the wall torn out of another. Another neighbor to the east had four sheds destroyed and the poultry and rabbits in them were killed. His house and new garage was left untouched.
We got the generator out and fired it up and plugged in the the refrigerators, freezer and a few fans to fight the summer heat. Camping lanterns provided us with light after dark and the gas grill cooked our meals.
We have been working till dark the last two days cleaning up and have several day more of work. We finally got the power back on late yesterday afternoon and starting to get a semblance of normality to our lives.
The funny thing about this twister is that 7-8 years ago a tornado took out our orchard, we are down to four trees and the orchard was completely untouched. It laid the bridge to the one of the islands on its side, bent the post to the bird house in the orchard and took out trees beside it.
Without electricity and working till dark we have not been able to tell our story until now. A few pictures of some of the damage. The fourth picture is of a large Black Oak that was uprooted The root ball was 10' tall. The Amish came and cut it up and they are going to use it to heat their school house. I have to go now and put some hours in with the chainsaw and the tractor.
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