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When your company earns unlimited 2% cash back on all purchases with Capital One. That's serious business. So Stephen at Sandcloud got a serious business card, the Spark Cash plus card from Capital One. We used our 2% cash back to help build our retail presence. Savvy Steven. And we get big purchasing power so our business can spend more and earn more. The SparkCashPlus card from Capital One. What's in your wallet? Terms and conditions apply. Find out more@capitalone.com sparkcashplus my first run in with the twister was when I was four years old, staying at Grandma's house. What I mainly remember was playing outside with Grandpa and then Grandma suddenly running outside and yelling at us to get in the house. There was a tornado coming. I had no idea what a tornado was at the time, but as we ran to the house, the weather went from calm to extremely windy on a dime. I remember nearly getting blown over and getting pelted by dust and leaves as we reached the porch, the power was out and I remember the wind getting really loud for quite some time. After things calmed down, we went back outside and found trash and debris everywhere and the big pine tree in the front yard had been uprooted and knocked over. No real damage to the house though apparently the tornado had just barely missed it. Neighbors houses were all fine as well, so it really seemed that everyone got lucky. I didn't really know exactly what happened until we saw it on the news the next day. It was apparently a pretty big deal as tornadoes are extremely rare. Where I live footage of the twister was shown and my grandma specifically pointed it out and said, see, that's what a tornado looks like. And I found myself completely entranced by it. There was just something fascinating as well as terrifying to little old me about a killer cloud coming down from the heavens to destroy everything in its path. It wasn't long before I officially fell down the tornado rabbit hole and movies like Twister became my favorites. The tornado was rated in F1. And on the news it appeared as a highly visible skinny brown funnel chewing through the trees. It was scary. April 2, 2006, an F3 tornado hit Hopkinsville, Kentucky. I was in a 2003 Chevy Avalanche with my mom and dog. We were in town on our way home from picking up my dog from a sitter. We had just got back from vacation. It was dark out around 8:30pm when out of nowhere, we found ourselves on the path of what would eventually be rated as an F3. My mom immediately had started panicking. She called my dad and asked where we should hide because we were literally in the middle of nowhere. She told dad that there was an overpass up ahead and that we were going to get out and take shelter in the overpass. My dad is an EMT and he told her absolutely not unless she wanted to get us killed or seriously injured. So my mom drove. Definitely not the safest course of action. I was five so I really didn't understand what was going on. I remember my dog, who was a long haired Chihuahua was in my lap in my booster seat. The way he was sitting was like trying to hold me in the booster seat. At one point it lifted our car and then just sat us back down. We made it to my grandma's and my dad was looking out the window and just saw the tree beside the house sway like it was going to hit our car. My mom then immediately grabbed me and the dog and we ran inside to get into the basement. I remember that it just sounded like a freight train and I didn't understand what was going on and why everything was so loud. Not even two minutes after we got in the house, the tree fell in the car and it would have killed us. That was my first experience and I didn't really grow with fascination towards tornadoes until probably the December 2021 tornadoes in Kentucky. That was my first tornado as an adult and I really understood just how dangerous the situation was and how lucky everyone on campus was, including myself. Because the tornado curved its path right before hitting campus. Ultimately it ended up turning and going down the US 31 bypass. I helped with recovery efforts and search and rescue. I unfortunately discovered people who were no longer with us and were very mutilated by the storm. My fascination really just came to understand my trauma. I think I'm still too afraid to chase a storm at this moment, but one day I hope I'll be able to. For me, learning about these phenomena and trying to understand them helped me deal with the Survivor's Guild as well as the ptsd that I'd gotten from this tornado. I now take all of the facts that I know about tornadoes and I make them kid friendly to help the kids that are ultimately traumatized by that storm that I currently work with to this day. We had a very bad thunderstorm and were under a tornado watch. The kids were terrified and sobbing. The only way I calmed them down was to tell them cool facts about tornadoes and also remind them that we were safe. It breaks my heart that these kids were so little when the storm happened and they are still very much affected to this day. I would say that a good 75% of the kids that I have are old enough to remember the storm or they're terrified of any sort of thunderstorm. I've actually got two stories. May 3, 1999 in the Oklahoma City area in eastern Oklahoma County. I knew that we were in trouble when our longtime meteorologist for the Oklahoma City area said, I don't think I've ever seen anything like this. The storm was in Chicasha at the time. We didn't have a storm shelter, so we got into the bathroom at the center of the house just before the storm hit. It got eerily quiet, like the birds started singing briefly. Then it sounded like a bomb went off. The entire house and walls shook. Then it got quiet again. My then husband left the bathroom and was walking around in the house but he didn't say anything for the longest time. I finally asked, is it safe for us to come out? He responded, I'm in our daughter's bedroom. I can see the sky. The roof was shaken off the north side of the house. The east wall was bowed in concave when the insurance adjuster came out. He said the structural integrity was so severely compromised that the house would have to be rebuilt from the ground up. Now for my second story. May 8, 2003 in Oklahoma City. Because you know, of course the day my divorce had become final plus it was my birthday, I was driving home to pick up my daughters from daycare and I had started hearing the tornado sirens. This time I was taking my daughter and me to a storm shelter at a local school. On the way to the local elementary school, the emergency broadcast system was broadcasting on all the radio channels giving the location of the storm in our immediate area. We arrived at the school and saw lots of people just standing around outside in the parking lot. Extremely strange. I parked my car and several of them ran up to me asking, do you have the key? The key to what? I asked. The key to the storm shelter in the basement it's locked and we can't get in, I countered. Have you called the principal of the school? At that moment, the emergency broadcast system broke in again. The tornado was bearing down at us and the sky was almost black. I made a snap decision. I yelled at my kids to get back in the car. I wasn't waiting around for someone who might not even arrive with a tornado less than five minutes away. Once we were all in the car, I peeled out of the parking lot and got back on the road. Where are we going? My oldest daughter asked. Anywhere but here, I replied. I remembered my tornado safety rules when driving away from a tornado. Drive away from the storm at right angles. The storm was headed east, northeast. I headed due west. At the next intersection, I drove through hail, high winds with roofing material swirling around us. Things got really gnarly. Then after driving about 15 minutes, I hit the edge of the storm where there was brilliant sunshine. Well, kids, we can't go back home and it'll be a while before we can. Wanna go to Barnes Noble on the west side of town? I asked them. Yeah, let's go to the bookstore, they said. So I kept driving across Oklahoma City to the Barnes and Noble at Quail Springs where we hung out for about three hours. Went to my dad's house after that and had a nice visit. Around 9:30pm I thought we needed to try and drive back home. Well, if your house isn't there anymore, you're welcome to come back and stay with us, my dad offered. I gave my dear old dad a hug and drove back home. Through some miracle, not only was our house still there, but it still had electricity. We were really grateful for that. July 2021. I was at my now fiance's house and we knew there was a storm coming in. We were at a decently high risk level from the spc. We had gone outside to take pictures of the clouds and watch the sky as things rolled in and eventually sat down on the porch as the rest of it rolled in. The clouds were this shade of blue. It was a very eerie color and I knew it was light refracting through the hail in the storm. But the moment I won't forget is when the wind went from quiet to just slowly increasing to a roar. It wasn't even that slow, but it wasn't a snap of your fingers change either. It just picked up and kept picking up until it sounded like a train about to hit. And I told my fiance we should probably go inside because that was the exact sound we'd heard that Accompanies a tornado. So we did and found out the power was out. My fiance was video recording the backyard when we went in where trees were whipping around like crazy and the rain was pounding the windows. And we confirmed later hell had hit the house. Rewatching it. There's a point where it leaves and I think cardboard pieces for some reason, if memory serves right, are up 3ish stories in the air and swirling around just outside the window. I'm pretty sure we actually caught the funnel or whatever on video too. There's a specific part of the video where you can see trees almost bending in half and a major change in intensity that tracks through the backyard. We then gather all the animals and everyone and went down to the basement to wait it out. I was a little freaked out because the power being out meant my crappy phone plan lost data and I couldn't see radar. So I was without any information on where and what the storm was doing. Once it died down, we all went back upstairs and outside and looked around. The front yard had a trash can knocked down and blown around and leaves and branches were strewn all around. A plastic lawn chair had gotten tossed. The backyard, well, the most obvious thing was a giant oak tree had been uprooted and fallen. It was pointing to the west with our backs to the house. Just to the right of it, a tree was twisted and partially wrapped around another tree at a 90 degree angle to the one that had fallen. And there were a few other trees in other directions like they had been pulled around like a funnel had come through. We could see the path in the trees where whatever had come through had gone. Because of the missing tree branches and stuff, the NWS isn't going to be able to confirm or deny if it was a funnel. I don't think. They did confirm though that they couldn't discern a tornado path. But a wind event with wind speeds equivalent of an EF1 tornado did occur. I think it was a funnel that couldn't quite form back up as the cell that hit us had produced two tornadoes earlier in the day up further north in the state. Anyways, that was an insanely cool and scary storm and I'm just glad it didn't hit worse. It was bad enough as it was. About five years ago, a tornado cut a path through the city I lived in. I'll admit I was actually two towns over at the time, so I was never really in any danger. But it cuts right through where my grandparents live. I was at Costco when my mom had told me that Three trees had fallen on my grandparents house. We tried driving there but got like half a mile past my house before the traffic just stopped dead. I proceeded to run several miles until I got to their street. The short way was blocked by firefighters who weren't allowing anyone to pass because of the down to power lines. They hadn't gotten to blocking off the long way yet. It was much worse. I traversed about 2 miles of what felt like a war zone. I climbed over fallen trees and army crawled under power lines. I found out later on that they were still alive at the time. So that was certainly very dangerous. It felt like I was playing Call of duty Modern Warfare 2 again. Houses were just ripped in half actually. I specifically remember thinking that it reminded me of pictures of the Haiti earthquake. I get to my grandparents house and this whole time I'm expecting it to just be gone. It actually wasn't too bad. There were some small to medium sized holes in the roof but nothing that couldn't be repaired. Windows were blown out and my grandma was hysterical. Best part was another two houses down and you wouldn't even know. They ended up with a massive insurance settlement and now they have a house worth probably double what it was before. After helping out there, I had walked to my high school which was maybe about two streets over. The place looked like it was bombed. Emergency services hadn't even gotten there yet. So I just walked right into one of the blown out windows, up to the top floor and just right on the roof. Five years later and they still haven't rebuilt that school, at least as far as I know. Okay, so it's a little long so bear with me. While it was an extremely traumatic event, I still consider us lucky because it could have been so much worse. We'll get to that later. So it was Memorial Day weekend and I was off the weekend but I had to work Monday night. We went up to my parents place at Marblehead, Lake Erie. We came back Monday afternoon in time for me to get to work. I work evenings at McDonald's as a manager while also going to school for nursing. My husband had been laid off a month prior, but he was doing Uber and ship to make money while he looked for a job. So despite that we were in a good place and things were going well at work that night. There was going to be another manager and I knew we were going to be slow so I tried calling off but my boss convinced me to go in because the other manager was still kind of new even though she was pretty capable of doing her job. I Don't remember the exact time, but it was probably around 10pm when I had started getting notifications on my phone about severe weather and a tornado in the area. Didn't think much of it. The storms that hit the Dayton area usually produce tiny tornadoes, something that might shake the leaves off a tree, but nothing major. If anything, this storm might drop a tornado east of the area in the country like the Xenia tornado of 74. I logged into Facebook because we were indeed dead at work and bored. I saw some friends reposting a video of one of the chief meteorologists at a news station, basically yelling at the viewers for wanting to get back to the Bachelorette when it was an extremely dangerous situation. I began texting my husband as well as got in contact with my boss. She said there's a tornado on the ground heading east, but she wasn't sure how big it was. Around 10:45pm we kicked out the two customers we had and closed the restaurant down early. I went outside around 11pm to see what was going on. We knew that the tornado was headed towards the Beaver Creek area, but tornadoes will do what they want and could end up wherever. I remember it was windy and there were lots and lots of lightning. I went back inside shortly after and we took shelter in the bathroom. During this time I was also in contact with my husband. We knew that he needed to take cover with the children. The problem was we didn't have a basement in our tiny townhouse. He joked about cutting a hole in the wall under the stairs and honestly that is something I considered in the past when serious storms came through but never produced anything. All of a sudden he texts me to take shelter. He tells me that he loves me and that they're getting hit. I of course freak out a little bit, hoping that he means just rain, but I can't get a hold of him for 45 minutes. I waited for word. I try to stay calm hoping that the worst didn't happen and maybe there's just no power or something. Finally we're able to get in contact but the receptionist spotty. He says we got hit. I ask how bad it was and he says you need to come home. We can't live here anymore. Of course I'm like oh crap. Sorry coworkers. I gotta go. We've been hit. I called my boss and told her that my house got hit and that I left for the night because I gotta get home to my family. I worked less than two miles from where I lived. It usually took me 10 minutes at most to get home this night, it took me over 30 minutes. There were so many large trees, branches and power lines down. Plus it was dark as crap, so it was extremely difficult to find my way around. My neighborhood was like 2 out of 3 neighborhoods all connected with multiple ways in and out. All but one were blocked. I finally made it to that entrance. I didn't know it was open. Just luck. I parked about a block away from my house just in case my road was bad. The scene was straight out of a movie. It was pitch black, but there were still tons and tons of debris everywhere. My first thought was finding my family. I knew that they had taken shelter with some neighbors around the corner from us, but I couldn't remember which house number it was. Furiously, I headed to the area that I thought they might be passing my house unit. I could barely make out the damage in the dark, but it wouldn't register until the next day. With the power out, the cell service wasn't great, but I managed to find him and my children. Some neighbors let us sit with them while the fire department made sure the gas was off and not a threat. They just had their windows blown out. So their house was in much better shape than ours. Ok, so this is part two. Here we go. So we had lived in this townhouse for seven years. Our final year of college, we'd moved in together. We got married, adopted a 7 year old cat, had a baby, adopted a dog and then had another baby. We went through the grief of losing a baby in this house and losing my father in law. We dealt with job losses and promotions. We had lots of good times and lots of bad times as well. While we only rented it, it was still our house. So my husband takes me to the unit where he's sheltering with some neighbors. The first thing my 3 year old says to me is, mom, I was super brave during the emergency. Oh my gosh. If my heart didn't break into a million pieces when I heard that, I just held my children close. We were there for about an hour to an hour and a half when the fire department made sure the risk of gas leaks and explosions were totally gone. One of the guys in that unit is a Redditor, so if he sees this, thank you for letting my family and my dog sit with you. The cat was fine as well. Both animals a little shaken up, but who wouldn't be? My husband just couldn't take the cat with him at the time. After we got the all clear, the neighbors offered to sit with our kids while we went back to our unit and gathered up a few things. Since we had just gotten back from our weekend away, we luckily still had our suitcase packed. We had a 2007 Mercury Mountaineer as our family car and a Chrysler 200 as our nice car, which is what my husband used for Uber and shipped. Luckily that night I took the Chrysler to work, but our Mountaineer was a total loss since it was so old we just had liability on it. But damn if that thing wasn't a freaking tank. It had the crap beat out of it and lost a mirror in a couple of windows, a windshield wiper, and the top rack was ripped apart, but it didn't move an inch. All the other cars in that area were beaten to hell and had been moved by the wind, but this thing stood firm. My husband thinks it possibly helped keep them safe. They were in the downstairs bathroom, which had two outside walls. He thinks the SUV kind of took the brunt of the damage, but all of the units in our area didn't have much damage to the bricks, though the others in the neighborhood did. But what I wouldn't do to have that car back anyways, we gathered a few essentials that we could find in the dark. Even with our cell phone lights, it was still hard to see all of the damage and find anything since we had no power, obviously. I had to grab all of my breast milk out of the freezer and fridge. You know you're a breastfeeding mom when the first thing you think about after a tornado is making sure you grab your milk. My husband somehow made it upstairs and got a beautiful cross stitch that my grandmother made us for our wedding. I was able to look upstairs, but there were walls and large pieces of ceiling all over the stairs and upstairs. I wanted to go upstairs to see the damage, but it would have to wait until morning. I tell you, it was very strange looking up my stairs and seeing nothing. The sky was so dark and dusty, it just looked like a void. I grabbed my poor cat and put him in one of our diaper bags because I didn't have a cat carrier. The poor thing was so scared that he had diarrhea in the bag. We loaded up our 200 with a few essential things because honestly, we didn't know if and when we'd be back. A shelter somewhere nearby had been made for people, but my parents were only an hour away and since we had two small children plus a cat and a dog, I knew it would be more comfortable for us to go there. And the sirens were still going off and the possibility of another tornado really scared us. So going to my parents was the safest thing for us. My dad went to Maher in the middle of the night to get litter and food for my cat, Bless his heart. Some people are like, I can't believe you got your cat like that. I mean, he's my responsibility. It's not fair to him if I leave him behind. I'm one of those people that will do whatever it takes to make sure my animals come with us if we have to flee. I'll never forget that night. The smell of the air was something I'll never forget. It's hard to describe it, but the best I can come up with Is the smell of sawdust, dirt, and must. The air was so still. Not even the slightest rustle. I had never seen or experienced such stillness. And it was quiet. Even when I worked 2, 3 in the morning. It was never this quiet. It's like the sound had been sucked right up. With the tornado. It was very surreal. And I literally felt like I was dreaming or in a movie. This is a time where you literally cannot believe your eyes as you're living. Was a very tough time for my family and I for a while. So to bring this to a full close after some time, we eventually ended up moving to Columbus. And then my husband got a job up in Mount Gilead, about an hour north. And we've been here since January. We miss Beaver Creek and Dayton Tuns, but we're doing really well now. I hope that you're all doing well also. What a crazy night that was. Washington EF4. I have stories I could tell that would take hours. I found a guy whose house was destroyed. And he was laying in a pile of debris right across the road a hundred yards. Called paramedics over from down the road where they had a fatality. The guy I found was severely injured. Broken femur, broken shoulder, punctured lock, huge gash on his head. But he made a full recovery after six months or so. I work in orthosurgery and talk to some of the staff who treated him. And my son knew his stepdaughter. He was the first one to the hospital after the tornado and the last one to leave. He would have died like his neighbor did if I hadn't found him and got help. I visited him a couple of times in the hospital and would occasionally see him around. Came to town, to my house where there was nothing left and nothing I could do. And was leaving to meet my family when someone found the neighbor a few doors down. In the rubble of his house. He was a 300 pound mentally challenged guy laying on his side and surrounded by debris. It started raining pretty hard again, so I knelt down over him with my umbrella. The whole right side of his face was plastered with fine debris and mud. Even his earhole was filled with it. When we had enough people, we lifted him onto a door and carried him out of the debris pile to a pickup truck. Three weeks later when I returned to work, I was part of the OR team that fixed his broken leg. Never saw him again. I heard that my neighbor across the street, a really mean old lady by the way, had been in her basement when everything collapsed and she was hit in the head or face by a falling brick facade. Apparently they got her to the triage and she coded the ambulance en route to the hospital. But they resuscitated her and she lived. This all happened on my way back into town. I never actually saw the tornado. I am an amateur chaser and knew how bad it could be that day. So I went out and headed towards Springfield, towards the first warned storm from earlier. My wife and kids were home but went into the basement of her house. She called me asking if there were tornadoes nearby and said she could see debris before they went to the basement. At this point I had turned around like 15 miles from home and did 100 miles per hour in my little Tacoma. She called me back to say they were fine but the house was badly damaged. I should say at this point that we had two houses. We had been renting a three story duplex townhouse and the week before we had purchased a house and hadn't moved in yet. That Sunday was going to be the big moving day. The houses were about a mile apart. The Tornado went about 150ish yards southeast of the new house where the family was in the basement. The roof was gone and the garage walls were gone. The center of the tornado was about a hundred yards northwest of the townhouse duplex. Its tall profile took all of the wind and was completely destroyed, even taking the flooring off the first floor. Most of our personal belongings were never found.