Fifteen years ago today.
I was 13 years old.I remember it rather well, because the day will always stick with me. It started out pretty much like any other Tuesday, only I remember how warm it was. For early March, it was really rather warm, around 75 or thereabouts. The wind was blowing pretty strong out of the south too, perhaps a promise of spring to come.
Unbeknownest to me, at 9 a.m., the National Weather Service issued a tornado watch. Now, the issuances of tornado watches is nothing new, especially during the spring months. However, this one was a little different in the fact that they issued it so early. Usually, they get issued around 1-2ish after the atmosphere has had time to destablize some as the sun cooks everything. So the atmosphere must have been boiling already.
I went about my business at school, hanging out with my friends, going to class, doing the normal things that any 7th grader does. Since it was Tuesday and my grandmother had the day off, she had offered to come pick me up from the middle school, after snagging my sister from the elementary school and we would go to a local hamburger joint for some ice cream.
Since it was so warm out, I asked grandma to swing by the house to grab a mini-basketball so I shoot some hoops at her house. My grandparents lived (and still live there today) in a split level house on the north side of town. I played some hoops for a while, (I'm sure I hit numerous game winning shots, or set some type of obscene scoring record, the kind of stuff kids dream about) then I went inside to catch some TV.
The TV is located in the family room in the half basement. I looked out the window and saw what just looked like a gray cloud above the tops of the trees. The TV had been spouting off warnings about a tornado in Reno County, or the county right next to our county. They were also saying that it was on the ground heading towards Burrton moving NE at anywhere between 40-50 m.p.h. (On the average tornados move on the ground around 30 mph. Burrton is southwest of my hometown about 15 miles as the crow flies.) At that point, I decided I would go get my basketball because I didn't want it to get wet. I was still counting on it being a thunderstorm.
As I went outside, I noticed that the sun was obscured by the gray cloud. It looked more like your average cloudbank that was heavy with rain. (Of course I didn't know that it was over 70,000 feet tall because the cloudbank was obscuring my view of the tower) I picked up my basketball and as I did that, the tornado siren began to go off.
There is probably nothing more chilling than hearing that sound when you have been hearing weather reports about storms coming. I didn't really freeze, I just looked to the southwest, then decided to get my ass inside. Mom was out at her horse to the north of town about 2 miles, while Dad was at work. I went inside and grandma and Mindy were watching the TV intently. At one point the cable got all snowy-fuzzy and a voice came over the fuzz and said "There is a tornado warning issued for western Harvey County. Take cover now. I repeat. A tornado warning has been issued for western Harvey County." (Funny thing, they don't often issue tornado warning for halves of counties, especially when the county they did, is the smallest county in Kansas.)
About that time, Dad showed up and said they had sounded the tornado buzzer at work, so he knew it was serious. He had gone home, saw that no one was home and assumed we were at grandma and grandpa's. Soon after that, my aunt and uncle showed up, mainly because their house didn't have a basement, mom following close behind.
Not too much longer after that the cable went out for good and next the power followed. By now it was black dark outside. We all went down into the deep basement and piled up under the pool table. My uncle and my dad, were on the back stairs (the ones leading up to the garage) trying to see what they could see.
We could actually hear the freight train like roar. Just the powerful roar of the wind.
Dad and Jim said that they thought that it had passed, so we went outside. The sky was just boiling, black, sea-green, navy blue. Over the houses to the NE, we could actually see the funnel itself, a churning black mass. We could only see it for a while as soon it seemed to have disappeared over the treetops. There were quarter-size pieces of hail in the yard. Many people were outside gazing at the sky. Not too many minutes later, the sun crept back out. We could hear the sounds of sirens blaring across town.
Neighbors began to compare notes as we thirsted for information since the power was still off. Someone said that tornado had gotten the Pizza Hut located out by the intersate on the edge of town. I was relieved because I thought, well that means it got the Pizza Hut and it can be rebuilt.
Dad, Mindy and I decided we would go home, so we headed that way and tried to go down a different way, to avoid main street because we thought we had heard sirens coming from that way. As we went by the lumber yard we came upon the feed mill located in the heart of town.
It was one of the first times I had ever sworn infront of my father, when I saw one of the silos that they kept feed in.
"Holyyyyy shit."
The silo looked as if it had been crumpled like a pop can. We then realized that the tornado infact had cut a swath through town. Our route home was blocked by damage. We turned around to try a different way, but that way was blocked too. We just went back to my grandparents. By then I had realized that my longtime friend's house had probably been hit by this tornado. I was a little bit panicked until some neighbors stopped by and told us that they were okay, but their house had been hit. It was starting to get dark when the police came down the street blaring out on the loudspeaker that another tornado was coming and we should take cover.
Fortunately about 20 minutes later, they came back by giving an all clear. We ended up having a meal, because my aunt had been cooking before the power went out, in fact, I think we heated it on a camp stove. I know we spent the night at my grandparents. By the morning they had the power restored to our little town. The next morning was drastically different from the previous day as we woke up to it being cold and gray. In fact it was almost frigid. I went with my parents to help clean up where my mom worked. Eventually, I strayed away, going to check up on a couple of friends whose homes were destroyed.
The tornado itself was (and I believe is still) one of the most powerful on record today. It was spawned from a supercell thunderstorm that formed well ahead of the incoming cold front, so it had all kinds of energy to feast on. The tornado touched down somewhere between Haven and Castleton, nearly wiping out the community of Yoder while bearing down on us.
It was on the ground for over 100 miles. Coming into town, the tornado was somewhere between one-half to three-quarters of a mile wide. Originally bearing down on the college and the business district of Hesston, a microburst (a sudden downdraft of winds that reach over 100 m.p.h.) pushed the monster directly north, changing the path enough not to demolish the downtown area. In the process, the thing may have elongated to more of an oval shape as the damage path was around 200 yards wide. After ravaging our town, it began to "rope-out" until the same storm produced another tornado just almost on the same path. In the book "Year of the Storms," there is a great picture of the two tornadoes, taken from directly east of Hesston. The monster is in its most violent stage, while the other one is beginning to head towards the ground. The two funnels joined together and raced northeast before finally dissapating up by Marion Lake. Fortunately, it didn't strike any other areas.
The F5 tornado only killed two people, a 6 year-old boy down by Burrton and an 80-something woman up by Goessel.
That's what happened on March 13, 1990.
posted by Rusty @ 11:49 AM
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