slo's Monday poll - Tornados

[becka]

http://www.srh.noaa.gov/lzk/html/tormar1a-nf.htm

March 1, 1997

I was visiting my parents in Cabot, AR because I was working on some wedding details and we knew that thunderstorms were forcasts for that day but we had NO idea. It started to get pretty bad with lots of reports of tornadoes and they were all coming our direction. I was already scared of torndaos and this made me very nervous. Things got bad pretty fast. There was no basement in my parents house so when the sirens started to go off my Mom, brother and myself got into the bathroom in the middle of the house with some pillows. My Dad and my soon to be DH went outside on the front porch to look despite my pleading with them not to. We could hear them talking to our neighbor. All of the sudden some words that you cannot say on the DIS were heard by my Dad, DH and the neighbor and my Dad and DH slam the front door and run into the bathroom where we all huddle as it gets very loud. It seems that the tornado was about 3-4 blocks over. I was so scared. Thankfully we did not get hit directly but I will never forget going outside when it was over (just a few minutes but it seemed like an enternity) and we saw tree limbs all around our house, pieces of trailer siding, toys and a single pair of Dockers came flying down in front of our house. Stuff the tornado was just spitting out when it came that close. I still can remember how I felt that day and I pray I never have that feeling again. Unfortunately it has really made me paranoid about more tornados and I am trying really hard not to let my kids see how scared I get when we have the warnings here.

I am sitting here physically shaking just as I type this out.

 

[irishbosoxfan]

Being here in KS has taught me a lot about tornadoes. The first storm we had after we moved here was tornadic and we were lucky to just get the straight line winds which for anyone who has had them knows the damage can be as bad as a tornado--But we ourselves were fortunate enough to only lose everything in our yard to include DH's grill

The second time I was on the highway driving up to Rapid City South Dakota just me and my DD who was 3 at the time---I noticed the icky sky but chalked it up to a storm then the rain started and stopped within minutes then the hail came, At first I just kept driving because being from the Northeast it didn't phase me much but noticed EVERYONE was on the side so I figured alright let me pull over then---I pulled over and that was when I started thinking tornado and kept trying to get something on the radio about it but could find nothing---Then the hail got worse,They were the biggest hail stones I had ever seen and they were pounding my car--I pulled DD out of the backseat and set her carseat up in the front then covered her with my leather jacket to protect her in case one of the windows blew out which they seemed pretty near to doing-----All of a sudden I notice the car in front of me is moving,now it is about 3pm and it is pitch black out and how I knew he was moving was because of the taillights.
I see his car turning around and my car is rocking back and forth and front to back and the noise from what I thought was the rain was all I could hear---And just as suddenly as it started it stopped,the sun came out and I got out of my car to look at the damage--My car was covered with huge dents,not just little dents but deep dents to include the steel cage that ran around the winshield,the windshield had a few like cuts in it and the passenger side mirror was broken right off---A few of us helped get the Toyota that was in front of me back onto the highway and then I drove down to the next exit and called DH from a payphoone and asked him to put it on the weather channel for info about the tornado

The last time I was involved was when a tornado touched down on the county line, went in for a few miles then lifted up over my house then touched down just on the other side of the river==the space it lifted up for was less than a mile and my house was in its path so we got very lucky

 

[precious pixie]

when I was a teenager at the beach with some friends we saw a water spout. It was a beautiful sunny day and then literally out of nowhere they sky turned black and the winds picked up. We were making our way over to the dock and then probably 3-5 miles out we saw a huge water spout form. It came pretty close to shore and then as quicky as it came it left. The skies cleared up and it was like nothing had happened. It was very strange

 

[DisnyMama]

I'm new to this part of the country-I'm used to earthquakes so tornados have me a little freaked out about living here. If it's not one thing it's another. My question is when you hear the sirens what are you supposed to do. I live in a townhouse so there is no basement. I am totally cluless as to what you do during tornado warnings. Thanks.