Tuesday, April 3, 2012

Tornado update...with photos

Whew!  That was really close.  Many parts of the DFW Metroplex, mainly south and southwest of me, were slammed pretty hard.  My brother called to tell me to turn on my TV as Frisco where I live was in the path.  TV showed live footage of a tornado as it hit a truck terminal south of downtown Dallas, throwing trailers weighing 6+ tons a good 300 feet into the air. It was amazing!


The news reported a second tornado near the North Dallas Tollway and SH190, just 3 or 4 miles to my south.  Then they mentioned our minor league baseball park was directly in line.  Ummm...that's just 2 blocks from me.  Time to head for our concrete parking garage.


Curiosity got the best of me and I went to the opening of our garage where it meets the street in order to see what things looked like.  Sure enough I saw two twisters pass right by me, not 300 feet to my west:



First it was just noticeably darker^


As it got closer I saw this very discernible funnel^


It made it close to the ground, but stopped short of actual touchdown.



A little later a second line moved through and I saw another trying to form^



In between the two lines it hailed like crazy.  A guy I was standing next to ran out and picked up one for me to photograph^

Meanwhile my daughter (the teacher) was at her school in south Garland where they herded everyone into the hallways and bathrooms. Eventually we established text contact, and it turns out she is fine.  Not too far east, however, in Forney an elementary school there was hit and damaged, but thankfully there have been no reports of injury.

My power is back on now after being knocked out for over an hour, so I'm just now catching up with the news.  Just heard that over 100 planes at DFW Int'l Airport were damaged, I presume by hail.

That's all to report for now.  Please pray they don't find any casualties as they dig into the damage.

S


7 comments:

  1. Glad you and the family escaped o.k.

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  2. I've bee following on TV and watched as that truck station got hit! Incredible. Glad you're safe.

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  3. Dang dude, I saw that article on the news and came straight here to see how it might have affected you! I think you a wee bit crazy going out there taking pics of tornadoes 300 feet away from you!

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  4. Glad you and your family are OK; hoping the same for everyone else in the area.

    As soon as I heard about it, I wondered about you and K. After I saw the news footage of a tractor trailer being hurled through the air, I was surprised that you even had electricity and internet access to write this post.

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  5. How frightening! So glad you are okay. That is too close for comfort.

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  6. our morning news program reported it and I, too, came straight here to check up on you! They showed some of those nice houses damaged and I thought that maybe one you built was affected?

    Keep safe!! Those things scare me! I consider them worse then earthquakes....

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  7. Glad you're all safe. I won't say sound because jeez - going out to take pictures? I probably would have done the same thing :)

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