When You Don't Make It

[Mortblanc]

I had a bad night last. Storms came through. There was a large "super cell" that developed in the center of our nation, then joined with several others to form a violent front that stretched from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico.

That is a 3000 mile wide storm system, and "super cells" are the storms that create violent tornados. The tornado alert went into effect in my area around 10pm and stayed in effect for the night.

At my place the storm got bad at around midnight with heavy winds around 50-60mph and rain bucketing down, thunder and lightening.

OK, I thought, if the power goes out I am set. I have had all the trees removed from near the house, everything is buttoned down. Food, water, fuel and everything needed is on hand for weeks if necessary.

I could not sleep and stayed up for most of the night. By that I mean that I did not go to bed until 4am when things calmed. Much of the storm had been nerve shattering and I hopped that all was well. I had turned off all the electronics when the storm began, to preserve them from storm surge and lightening strikes.

I woke this morning to discover that the "super cell" had spun off numerous scattered tornadoes and one full power storm of F3 level that traveled for a path of destruction for 250 miles, totally destroying everything in its path.

My state is 800 miles from east to west. The western section is a wide flood plain of the Mississippi River. That flat prairie goes for 250 miles with no hills, mountains or canyons to break the path of a weather system. That large tornado set itself down at the Mississippi River and ran east across the relatively empty farm land. Then it hit a small town named Mayfield, Kentucky. That town is 300 miles west of me. My grand parents had spent the last years of their lives about 20 miles north of there. I know the area well.

I turned on the computer this morning to discover that Mayfield is gone! Beside the destruction of the material structures it struck an industrial park, most of the facilities running 24/7 shifts. In that park was a factory that made candles. Decorative candles, and it being the holidays they were running a night shift to fill demand. 110 people were at work.

This morning only 40 of them are accounted for. Another 70 from scattered points in my state are dead. More than 100 total but there is no firm number at this point.

I don't know how many of those people were "fully prepped". I don't know how many of those flat homes were stocked for a year of SHTF. I don't know how many had generators, lanterns, torches, farming tools to rebuild society.

It does not really matter, they are dead. They did not see it coming, they could not avoid it, they could do not one thing about the situation that took them.

I know, that's too bad, life must go on, stiff upper lip make a cup of tea and carry on.

But it doesn't. Not for the people that lost a husband, wife, son, daughter or grand child in a crushed building and it was absolutely no one's fault. No one to blame, no one to hold responsible as negligent. It is not the government's fault, the sheeples fault, the media's fault, or the responsibility of the New World Order.

They are grieving, and they are grieving in the rain outside a flattened house beside a pickup truck that is upside down in the drive with the temps hovering around freezing. They are addled, they can not think straight, they are in shock and they can not even be held responsible for their own actions at this point, much less expected to "carry on". The immediate concern is "how many funerals do I need to plan?"

We stay detached from these disasters, evaluate them, critique the effectiveness of the responses, discuss what these people "should have in case of emergency". But what happens when after decades of training, selective buying, storing and stashing one dark night at 1am Godzilla stomps on your @$$ ???

You are still alive but everyone you loved is dead under a pile of rubble and you can't dig them out because you have a broken arm that has not been treated. You are sitting under the roots of an overturned tree, in the dark, in pain, in grief and completely disoriented. Your arm is broken, you are bloody, battered, no one is answering your screams and you don't know where your trousers went.

Good luck with that!

Oh you say you have lots of supplies in the house?

Sorry, you have no house, it's gone to OZ.

Now what you gonna do mighty prepper?

[Straight Shooter]

Just seen it on the news MB , and before I read your post I sent you a pm unaware of your situation !

I feel your desperation for your fellow countrymen and the sheer disaster along with the total despair that’s unfolded on them , I will send up a prayer .......you stay safe my friend ....that’s an order ......

[Pete Grey]

We feel for you and your countrymen after such devastation, we over here cannot imagine the power of such a storm system. Our thoughts are with the people who have lost their loved ones and their homes. Stay safe MB.

[LAC]

So sorry to hear this very sad and distressing news. I have relatives in Ohio, the state above yours, and fortunately they were spared the worst of it. The sense of powerlessness must be extremely depressing.

[CharlesHarris]

MB, glad you are OK, but losses are tragic. K9 search dogs from WV are being deployed with their handlers to aid in rescue and body recovery. WV State Police search dogs also assisted at the Pentagon after 9-11. Neighbor is search dog handler and body recovery is very hard emotionally on the dogs. Live rescues always a joy for all.
When not happy outcome plush toy is not enough and both dog and handler need to hold each other and cry together for a while before going back to work. Dedicated.

[bigpaul]

the only way I wont make it is when I am dead, whilst there is still breath in my body then I will keep trying.
good luck to everyone who has been affected by the storms in America.
is there some cultural reason why almost every US house I see on any news report is made of wood??

[Mortblanc]

Yes Paul we are all aware that you are a superior being, a god unto yourself, untouched and unfazed by the problems of us mortals.

You have a fixation with Americans and wooden houses Paul.

History/geography/environmental lesson for you, we have wood! You think there are forests in England, those are not forests, they are parks. To this day we have vast forests and harvest millions of board feet of wood as a renewable rescore. Almost 1/3 of the US land mass is forest. Better than half of North America total is harvestable forest.

One year of our lumber harvest would probably rebuild every detached house in the UK.

In every culture people built their homes with the materials available in their area; stone, wattle and daub, brick, logs, and in my general area, dimensional lumber.

Yes, once it was logs, because we had logs. Then a religious sect of Quakers, called the Shakers, invented the circular saw. That made sawing the trees into easily stacked and carried boards possible.

That trend of building with sawed up lumber began back in the late 1800s due to one historical event, The Great Chicago Fire. There was a woman milking her cow in the city of Chicago and she tipped over her lantern. The hay caught fire, the barn caught fire and within minutes the city caught fire.

Just as in the Great Fire of London, the entire city populated by millions had to be rebuilt. London was rebuilt with brick, that was what you had. It was used because it was fireproof, not stormproof.

Chicago was at the edge of the Northern coniferous forest of Michigan and Wisconsin, where wood was available, easily transported and cheap. Our present technique of "balloon framing" was invented in the reconstruction of Chicago as the fastest way to rebuild a structure.

That is why we build homes from wood. It is available, it is cheap, it makes construction fast and it is renewable. It is one reason why our houses are larger, and cheaper than houses in Europe'

You will find that modern houses in England are built the same way, with a single vainer layer of brick to give the impression of a "brick house". It is not built of brick, it is simply covered with a layer of brick. You just have to import your lumber from elsewhere.

As for the durability of a brick or stone home in a tornado, don't try to kid yourself. Perhaps a stone/brick house will withstand a gale with 100 mph winds, 120mph??? On a good day 150mph!!!

How about a stone house in a rotational wind of 320 mph that is not "blowing down trees" but is unscrewing them out of the ground and depositing them 50 miles away?

Every part of the U.S. is subject to the formation of tornadoes. It is the way our land mass is laid out and the direction of frontal system movement in the U.S.

It does not matter what you building is made from it is going down in an F5 tornado.

I have lived with these thing all my life. I have seen pencil sized twigs shot into one side of a mini-van and out the other. I have seen gravel picked up from the ground and driven into the side of a brick house to crumble the walls. I have seen vehicles turned upside down where they sat, every body panel shredded like a can opener had been at it, every piece of glass gone and oddly covered with mud and dead frogs! I have seen the long distance electrical transport pylons stomped into the ground like a Greek Titan had been on a rampage.

I have seen several banks, Financial institutions made of the stone or brick you think more durable, completely flattened except for the vault. Steel walls a foot thick, set into concrete with a 3 meter foundation surrounded by 1/2 meter reinforced concrete walls. That survived.

TWe do not prep for tornadoes, we prep for their aftermath. For the weeks it will take for the utilities to be restored, the water pumping and the roads cleared.

You don't prep for a tornado, you pray through one. And you do not pray that you live through it, You pray that it misses you!

[MaryN]

Oh my God, MB, I have just seen your post. I saw the news reports of the situation over there. I don't know what to say - it looked absolutely terrifying. I cannot imagine such destruction. I am glad you are safe, and I can only say that your countrymen are in my prayers.

[CharlesHarris]

MB is right. Many farms have poured, reinforced concrete root cellars which double as "hide holes". I've seen heavy steel vault doors with heavy metal cross bars ripped off their hinges and dropped miles away. The high school I attended in Fairfax, VA has been struck by tornadoes twice in my lifetime, destroyed and rebuilt.

[bigpaul]

I lived in a stone built house on moorland that is now about 300 years old and withstood anything that the British weather could throw at it.
new UK brick houses are built not of a single brick skin but are double walled tied together, I know because I have worked in the Construction industry.
I merely asked about American wooden houses because in "Tornado Alley" I would have thought there would be a legal requirement for some material more substancial, its not Just in America in Canada there are a lot of wooden houses too I helped build one many years ago.