Dispatch from Tornado Alley

Wow.

First off, we're okay, and did not have any damage to the apartment building. In fact, the pots of dead flowers on my deck were not even moved or anything. All of this despite having a tornado touch down a mile or so north of where we live.

Ames Home Leveled By Tornado
Tornado Sirens Clear Stands At ISU
Residents Find Homes Destroyed, Belongings Scattered: At Least Eight Other Towns Hit
Tornado Kills 1 In Stratford: Tornadoes Touch Down In Central Iowa
Photos Note: The first few in this series were taken from my sister's neighborhood. Luckily, none of us were in town. We were in Manson celebrating my nephew's first birthday. It was hard at first, because we couldn't get any info on what areas were affected. Later, we called home and the answering machines were working, so we knew we at least had electricity.

We have an astounding group of meterologists working for KCCI, the CBS affiliate in Des Moines. Without them, we would have had a lot more people dead or seriously injured. These things were popping up frequently, and the guys stayed on the air, switching between live radar, webcams from SchoolNet, and the storm chaser trucks. Just great coverage, for hours.

More links:

Towns hit by tornadoes wake up to debris, disaster
Cyclone fans encounter the real thing before game Note: Some people asked me why the game went on. First of all, it would have been very bad to have all of those people trying to get out of town into an iffy weather or debris situation. The stadium had no damage, they had power, and the storms had passed. We really didn't need tens of thousands of people complicating traffic in town. Let them watch the game while the authorities assessed the situation in town. It ended up being the right decision. And we WON!
Woodward on Sunday: Church bells and chain saws
Stratford on Sunday: 20 percent of town displaced

Needless to say, everyone at my nephew's party was watching the situation closely. We had a bad moment when the inital storm track was shown for the one that hit Ames, as it pretty much showed a line going straight through my neighborhood. I couldn't breathe, and Kim and I just held hands while I tried not to cry. Then my son came in the room just as I was losing control, and started to get upset. That helped me calm down enough to try to think about what needed to happen next.

Of course, about this time, I started to crack jokes. "Well, at least I know where my insurance agent is..." (the next room), and "At least if this house is gone, I won't have to finish cleaning out that closet." Kim said I could stay with her, and I told her she could stay with me if either of our houses were gone. We went back to the party, and tried calling friends to see what happened. I called my lab monitor at work, and she told me they had watched it go past, and were still watching it. About half an hour later, after trying repeatedly to get through to a friend, I decided to call home, and got the answering machine. Kim tried after that, so we knew things were okay, but not the specifics.

Both of us just kept repeating how lucky we were to not have been there, and that the damage was not worse.

And I am not going to go see the damaged area in town. I have seen enough of that to last me a lifetime, having gone through a whole summer of clean-up when I was seven (Manson's F4). TV is bad enough without seeing it in real life. Plus, it is disrespectful to the people involved. What I will do is donate money if some sort of fund is set up for the family that lost their home in town. I don't think I know them personally, but I still want to help.

Again, this was the craziest thing... This is also the second tornado to hit Ames this fall. I just wonder what the rest of the year will bring...