Storm Damage

Last Thursday evening we had some excitement here. You may or may not have heard about the storm system that came through south central Nebraska. The weather people think there were tornadoes in it-- in fact, there is evidence that one touched down just a quarter mile from our friend Swede's farm place. But fortunately for him, thanks to the grace of God, he only had a pivot twisted, and a small branch off one tree broken off.

For others, the storm was more serious. Just four miles east, in the town of Aurora, there was much more damage: buildings destroyed, grain bins crumpled up and thrown around like aluminum foil, signs down, pivots turned upside down, trees broken, semis knocked over (while driving on the interstate!), and even train cars blown over. (In fact, in Kearney, a town an hour west of here, they had ninety train cars blown over.)

During the storm our power went out, and even though it wasn't quite sunset yet, it was dark enough in the house we couldn't do much, (not to mention we couldn't use our computers...!) so when things quieted down, we went for a drive. And of course, along with the emergency vehicles which were out checking on people and damage, we met much of the hometown, all out checking on things too. Even Hubby's folks were sitting in front of their garage on lawn chairs when we went by. We wheeled around to say hi, and Hubby's dad called out, "Do we look like old people?"

We asked them if they were enjoying the parade, since, by the number of trucks going by, it appeared interstate traffic was being re-routed down our road. It turned out later that not only were at least 8 semis overturned on the highway, there were also high voltage lines down across the interstate.

Well, if Hubby's folks were being old folks, we were being tourists, because we went around and let DrummerDude snap photos of the damage with his new camera. He's still learning how to adjust all the adjustments, so many of his pictures did not turn out as clear and nice as he wanted, but he chose a few to let me post here.

Blogger is being a pill, so I can't post captions by each one. Here are captions for all of them:

1) Here's one reason we were without power. The wind picked up a pivot and hung it from a power line.

2) A closer look.

3) You can't see very well, but behind those trees there's a smashed in grain bin. Also at this farm place there was a grain bin blown over the house into the field, and crumpled in to a giant ball. In addition, many of the trees in the yard were broken off.

4) The tattered remains of the storm clouds.