Friday, April 4, 2008

Tornado TOO CLOSE to home!

Maybe you heard on the news that a tornado (tornadoes?) touched down here in central AR last night. And major flooding. We are grateful to be okay! It got pretty scary last night. I was at home alone with the boys, and the first time the sirens went off was right after they had finally gone to sleep (which takes longer in thunderstorms, of course! arg). We had never had any tornadoes come close, so I ignored it. Then I turned on the news and saw what was really going on. When the sirens went off again, I woke them up and we went into our closet under the stairs. Poor Fluffy was so scared he was shaking. The other two were just cranky. When the siren stopped, Exacto said, "NOW can we go back to bed?"

By then it was on the news that a mobile home park was burning (about 1 mile and a half away) and 20-25 houses on a road about a mile from us had been seriously damaged. The sirens went off again and I woke them up again to go back to the closet! The Target near our house was damaged, as well as a car dealership. We luckily were untouched by the tornado, which turned out to be an F2. But the rain continued pouring, and now there was risk of flooding. I was panicked about DC on the road. (His quartet had played a concert in a town 3 hours away, and now were driving home in all this.) I kept calling to make sure they were okay. They had to pull over a couple of times, but finally made it to Little Rock by about 1:30am.

Meanwhile I had heard rushing water to the east of our house. I opened our front door and was horrified to see a raging river that ran from our neighbor's yard (and house!) across the cul-de-sac then down our side yard. It took out about half of our fence, and our poor neighbors are having to replace all their flooring, and maybe some of their cabinets. The Interstate just west of us was closed due to flooding, and also the main highway near our house, so there was no way for DC to get home from LR. He ended up sleeping in the car in his tux! Crazy. Anyway, I'm just glad he got safely home this morning!



The boys' school was closed today, and everyone was pretty tired. We're looking forward to a peaceful Conference weekend, and hopefully our ward elders quorum will be helping with cleanup, too.

I'll try to post some pictures tomorrow. . . .

7 comments:

Stephanie Johnson said...[Reply to comment]

Oh my gosh! I'm glad that your damage was minimal. Have a good weekend!

Becky said...[Reply to comment]

So glad to hear the you all are safe and well.

Mandy said...[Reply to comment]

So relieved to hear you are all safe. Mom told me what was going on right after you called her during the tornado, and you, the boys and Chris on the road were all in our prayers. Love you and hope we can see you so much sooner than later.

Devin and Melinda said...[Reply to comment]

What a night! I am glad that everyone is safe and that there wasn't any serious damage done to your property. Hopefully you will be able to have a peaceful Conference weekend.

Maria said...[Reply to comment]

Wow! Something you've probably never seen before... especially being from Arizona!

Tasha said...[Reply to comment]

I'll take Calif earthquakes anytime over the other natural disasters around the US. What a scary experience! I'm very glad to hear you are all doing well!

llamitanan said...[Reply to comment]

I'm sure glad our prayers were answered and that you were all save! Thanks for sharing your experience. I hope you won't have another like it to share.