Braving the Storm
Levi, Victoria, and I were outside, pulling weeds and shooting the breeze, when the tornado siren sounded at 5:30 on Monday afternoon. I had gone out a few minutes earlier to gather up any small items I could find, to put them away safely, in light of the pending storm. I yelled, "Everyone to the basement," and that's where we headed. I grabbed a radio and my phone on the way, and Victoria dashed upstairs to get her hamster, then rounded up the dog and cat, before making her way to the basement. Levi didn't argue, he just ran downstairs immediately.
Summer thunderstorms are very common here in Gering. They usually strike in the late afternoon, assaulting us with gusty wind and 20 minutes of torrential rain, generally amounting to a quarter of an inch of precipitation when all is said and done. Hail is not uncommon, but we grit our teeth before each storm, praying that any hail will skip over Gering, or at least be pea sized and brief in duration.
This storm was different. Weather forecasters were warning us to take this one seriously, meaning that we should skip our normal western Nebraska practice of standing in the front yard when the tornado siren sounds, scanning the skies to see what we can see.
As I drove across town for an errand that morning, I noticed several weather spotters' vehicles, including a huge truck with a satellite dish mounted on the back, parked in front of a nearby motel. When virtually all of the nation's storm trackers converge in our town, we can't help but pay attention.
The air had been heavy all day, and the clouds had become more threatening as the day progressed. As the shrill siren sounded for the first time, the sky grew ominously darker. I flipped on the lights in the basement and turned on the radio. For the next two hours, we stayed in the basement, folding laundry, ironing a few shirts, and listening to the radio broadcast one tornado warning after another, and sometimes two or three at once. The next morning, reports confirmed ten tornadoes in our two county area, and as many as thirty-three in the Nebraska panhandle and nearby eastern Wyoming.
The house was dark as night when I dashed upstairs to use the bathroom. I glanced out the window into the backyard, to see a lake covering our patio, then grabbed a loaf of bread, and jars of peanut butter and jelly, and took them downstairs to make sandwiches, since it didn't look like we would be coming upstairs for supper any time soon.
Our lights flickered off and back on again a couple of times, but parts of Gering and the rest of the panhandle were without power for several hours. Bill stayed at his office to monitor the storm and reboot equipment as needed, running his auxiliary generator for the four hours his office was without electricity.
Meanwhile, here at home, in our not-so-lovely basement, Levi played on his Nintendo 3DS, Victoria texted back and forth with her boyfriend, and I checked in, via text, with Meagan, Erin, and Bill, while monitoring the radio closely for further developments. Our scaredy-cat dog, Jackson, found a spot close to Victoria to curl up for a nap, and the hamster was content to roll all over the basement floor, safe inside her plastic ball. Charlie, our cantankerous cat, sat on the stair landing close to the door, poised to escape from the basement as soon as possible.
I've seen video clips of some of the formidable tornadoes that crisscrossed our area Monday night. I've heard numerous stories of the heroic people who rushed to Bayard, twenty-five miles east of us, to remove downed trees from roads and cars and at least one house, and to help evacuate the nursing home that was hard hit by a tornado that touched down there. I've seen photos of 4-inch hailstones and smashed windshields, flooded fields, damaged roofs, boarded-up windows, and a few destroyed houses and farms.
Here in my yard, I dumped a little more than an inch and a half of water from the rain gauge. The small amount of pea sized hail that fell here didn't damage anything, as far as I can tell. However, I heard a story from a friend, about a local meteorologist who insists that, but for God's gracious intervention, Gering might have taken a direct hit from a powerful tornado that should have formed from the terrifying maelstrom he witnessed directly above our town.
Lots of people, both local and scattered all over the country, were praying for the people in the Nebraska panhandle Monday night. And, as bad as it was, no one was killed, injuries were few and relatively minor, and the damage was not overwhelmingly catastrophic, because most of the tornadoes stayed in the unpopulated areas surrounding our tri-cities of Scottsbluff, Gering, and Terrytown.
You would think that thirty-plus tornadoes would cause a whole lot more damage than they did. But then, you would be leaving God out of the picture.
I would hurry to my place of shelter, far from the tempest and storm.
Psalm 55:8 NIV
Summer thunderstorms are very common here in Gering. They usually strike in the late afternoon, assaulting us with gusty wind and 20 minutes of torrential rain, generally amounting to a quarter of an inch of precipitation when all is said and done. Hail is not uncommon, but we grit our teeth before each storm, praying that any hail will skip over Gering, or at least be pea sized and brief in duration.
This storm was different. Weather forecasters were warning us to take this one seriously, meaning that we should skip our normal western Nebraska practice of standing in the front yard when the tornado siren sounds, scanning the skies to see what we can see.
As I drove across town for an errand that morning, I noticed several weather spotters' vehicles, including a huge truck with a satellite dish mounted on the back, parked in front of a nearby motel. When virtually all of the nation's storm trackers converge in our town, we can't help but pay attention.
The air had been heavy all day, and the clouds had become more threatening as the day progressed. As the shrill siren sounded for the first time, the sky grew ominously darker. I flipped on the lights in the basement and turned on the radio. For the next two hours, we stayed in the basement, folding laundry, ironing a few shirts, and listening to the radio broadcast one tornado warning after another, and sometimes two or three at once. The next morning, reports confirmed ten tornadoes in our two county area, and as many as thirty-three in the Nebraska panhandle and nearby eastern Wyoming.
The house was dark as night when I dashed upstairs to use the bathroom. I glanced out the window into the backyard, to see a lake covering our patio, then grabbed a loaf of bread, and jars of peanut butter and jelly, and took them downstairs to make sandwiches, since it didn't look like we would be coming upstairs for supper any time soon.
Our lights flickered off and back on again a couple of times, but parts of Gering and the rest of the panhandle were without power for several hours. Bill stayed at his office to monitor the storm and reboot equipment as needed, running his auxiliary generator for the four hours his office was without electricity.
Meanwhile, here at home, in our not-so-lovely basement, Levi played on his Nintendo 3DS, Victoria texted back and forth with her boyfriend, and I checked in, via text, with Meagan, Erin, and Bill, while monitoring the radio closely for further developments. Our scaredy-cat dog, Jackson, found a spot close to Victoria to curl up for a nap, and the hamster was content to roll all over the basement floor, safe inside her plastic ball. Charlie, our cantankerous cat, sat on the stair landing close to the door, poised to escape from the basement as soon as possible.
I've seen video clips of some of the formidable tornadoes that crisscrossed our area Monday night. I've heard numerous stories of the heroic people who rushed to Bayard, twenty-five miles east of us, to remove downed trees from roads and cars and at least one house, and to help evacuate the nursing home that was hard hit by a tornado that touched down there. I've seen photos of 4-inch hailstones and smashed windshields, flooded fields, damaged roofs, boarded-up windows, and a few destroyed houses and farms.
Here in my yard, I dumped a little more than an inch and a half of water from the rain gauge. The small amount of pea sized hail that fell here didn't damage anything, as far as I can tell. However, I heard a story from a friend, about a local meteorologist who insists that, but for God's gracious intervention, Gering might have taken a direct hit from a powerful tornado that should have formed from the terrifying maelstrom he witnessed directly above our town.
Lots of people, both local and scattered all over the country, were praying for the people in the Nebraska panhandle Monday night. And, as bad as it was, no one was killed, injuries were few and relatively minor, and the damage was not overwhelmingly catastrophic, because most of the tornadoes stayed in the unpopulated areas surrounding our tri-cities of Scottsbluff, Gering, and Terrytown.
You would think that thirty-plus tornadoes would cause a whole lot more damage than they did. But then, you would be leaving God out of the picture.
God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble.
Psalm 46:1 NIV
As we thank God for his protection and provision, we continue to pray for everyone whose lives have been disrupted by Monday's tornadoes.
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