Horrible Weather of April 27, 2011

Horrible  Weather of April 27, 2011


It really began about 4:30 AM Wednesday morning. We were asleep so we didn’t know anything about it. By 8:00 AM another storm was rolling through. There were tornado warnings in it, but we just watched it on TV. After that bout of bad weather and rain, it slacked up and I was about to go to town for some groceries. I decided not to when I realized another storm was coming and would catch me at Walmart.

Sure enough, I would have been out in the storm had I not stayed at home. There were tornado warnings with this storm too but we just watched it on TV. The television was full of all the foul weather coming from the West and South West. The weather sirens were going off constantly and the rain was severe. We watched the TV carefully to see where the storms were headed. There were tornadoes on the ground but not around us.

Sometime that afternoon, Frank said, “Let’s go to the basement”. We gathered up all of our important papers and meds, got the birds in their carriers and went too the basement. We got situated in our safe room and waited. I went back upstairs to see what the weather was doing and saw that the storm had passed us by. We came back upstairs but left the birds in their carriers and our important stuff in the basement in case we had to flee again.

No tornadoes came near us, but did do much destruction in the Tanner and other areas near us. A large tornado hit Tuscaloosa, the home of the University of Alabama and killed a few people there.

The tornadoes hit in Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and Tennessee but the most destruction was in Alabama. President Obama came to Tuscaloosa to see the damage and said federal money would be available.

It was said that 91 tornado warnings had been issued. The devastation was wide spread and it was horrible to see people’s homes nothing but a pile of rubble. Over 100 people were killed in Alabama alone.

It was really a day of unbelief. Wave after wave of storms came with little relief. We had to stay by the TV and radio to know what was happening and where. After the “all clear” was issued, we could relax and go to bed knowing we would be safe.