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Page 1: Tornado coverage

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04-1

5-11

F5 261-318 mph

F4 207-260 mph

F3 158-206 mph

Spawned by Hurricane Rita Sept. 25, 2005: levels F0 - F1

F2 112-157 mph

F1 73-112 mph

F0 40-72 mph

Fugito Scale

Tornadoesby month62 since 1950

J F M A M J J A S O N D

51

0.2

%

51

0.2

%

61

2.2

%

122

4.4

%

71

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.1%

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132

Hurric

ane R

ita (1

3)

* Percentages are based on a

total of 49 tornadoes,

which is the total minus the

13 spawned from Rita.11 fatalities and 144

injuries. The Dec. 16, 2000, tornado left an

18-mile path of severely damaged neighborhoods, mobile

home parks and businesses. Some structures completely disintegrated.

April 8, 1998: The tornado ripped through Tuscaloosa

County as an F3, destroying 5 homes and

11 mobile homes. It strengthened to an F5 as it

entered Jefferson County, killing 32 and

injuring 256.

March 3, 1966: Candlestick Park Tornado, named after the shopping center that it destroyed in Jackson, Miss., crossed over three states. The tornado, killed 58, including one in Buhl. 518 injuries were recorded.

1950-2011Tuscaloosatornadoes

5920

10 miles

11

82

82

43

69

216

171

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Tuscaloosa

Northport

Samantha

By Adam JonesStaff Writer

TUSCALOOSA

When Gary Honeycutt tells people from out of town that he’s from Samantha, they know one thing

about it.“They say, ‘Y’all live where all the torna-

does are in Tuscaloosa County,’ ” said Hon-eycutt, chief of the Samantha Volunteer Fire Department.

But on April 15, Samantha was spared when a line of severe storms across the Southeast spawned a twister in another fa-vorite haunt for tornadoes south of down-town Tuscaloosa.

“I was glad that it wasn’t Samantha, be-cause it usually is,” Honeycutt said.

Data from the National Weather Service and the National Climatic Data Center was used to map 61 known tornadoes since 1950, revealing what folks here have long suspect-

ed: Tuscaloosa County has two tornado al-leys, one north of the cities of Northport and Tuscaloosa and another south.

But the data also reveals tornadoes can spin most anywhere, and meteorologists are skeptical that the topography of the land has any correlation to the thunderstorms that breed tornadoes.

“If there is, it’s really weak,” said Harold Brooks, head of the Modeling, Observa-tion and Analysis Team Forecast Research and Development Division National Severe Storms Laboratory in Norman, Okla.

“There may be some physical aspect that we just don’t understand, but proving it is incredibly diffi cult.”

After decades of research, a lot is known

Tuscaloosa County’s deadliest recorded tornadoesJAN. 22, 1904: F4 tornado kills 36, injures 150MARCH 21, 1932: F4 tornado kills 37, injures 200MARCH 3, 1966: F5 tornado kills 1, injures 518DEC. 16, 2000: F4 tornado kills 11, injures 144

Source: Alabama SKYWARN Foundation, Inc.

STAFF FILE PHOTO

BELOW: Terry Boggs walks through the rubble of what was once his home in the Bear Creek Trailer Park in Tuscaloosa after an F4 tornado ripped through on Dec. 16, 2000.

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TUSCALOOSA TORNADOES FOLLOW TWO MAIN TRACKSWhile data reveals tornado alleys in Tuscaloosa County, weather experts say the twisters’ paths are unpredictable

Smartphone tracking has users uneasy

By Jordan RobertsonThe Associated Press

SAN FRANCISCO | If you’re worried about privacy, you can turn off the function on your smartphone that tracks where you go. But that means giving up the services that probably made you want a smartphone in the fi rst place. After all, how smart is an iPhone or an Android if you can’t use it to map your car trip or scan reviews of nearby restaurants?

The debate over digital privacy fl amed higher last week with news that Apple Inc.’s popular iPhones and iPads store users’ GPS coordinates for a year or more. Phones that run Google Inc.’s Android software also store users’ location da-ta. And not only is the data stored — allowing anyone who can get their hands on the device to piece together a chillingly accurate profi le of where you’ve been — but it’s also transmitted back to the companies to use for research.

Now, cellphone service providers have had cus-tomers’ location data for almost as long as there have been cellphones. That’s how they make

‘Coolest job ever’ vanishing as space program shrinks

By Kenneth ChangN.Y. Times News Service

What happens when you have the right stuff at the wrong time?

Members of NASA’s astronaut corps have been asking just that, now that the space shuttle pro-gram is ending and their odds of fl ying anywhere good anytime soon are getting smaller. The En-deavour is scheduled to launch this week, and the Atlantis is supposed to fl y the last shuttle mission in June — and all the seats are spoken for.

“Morale is pretty low,” said Leroy Chiao, a for-mer astronaut who now works for a company that wants to offer space fl ights for tourists. “This is a time of great uncertainty.”

Under President Barack Obama, NASA’s hu-man spacefl ight program has been curtailed. The Ares I and Constellation programs, which were meant to succeed the space shuttles and take astronauts to the moon, were canceled, and NASA is instead hiring outside companies to de-vise alternatives.

$61

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Garrett Reisman left NASA last month for SpaceX, a private company in Colorado Springs, Colo. “Being an astronaut is the coolest job ever,” Reisman said. “It was very, very difficult to voluntarily leave.”

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To see more on Tuscaloosa’s tornado history, check out our interactive graphic at www.tuscaloosanews.com.

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Page 2: Tornado coverage

‘A very surreal day’

APRIL 27, 2012

PHOTO | JAMIE CICATIELLO

Rescue and recovery teams sift through the wreckage in Alberta and Holt after the April 27 tornado.

Minutes after storm, emergency responders rushed to rescue

By Stephanie TaylorStaff Writer

Surreal is a word that comes up often when emergency responders talk about April 27, 2011.

It’s fi tting.The deadly winds of the tornado left be-

hind an eerie silence and sunny skies that seemed an impossible backdrop to de-struction that stretched for miles.

The sounds of sirens and chain saws soon pierced the silence. The evening sun settled into a harrowing night that marked the beginning of Tuscaloosa’s

new reality.“It was a very surreal day,” said Tusca-

loosa County Sheriff ’s Offi ce Cpl. Mark Weaver. “But after a while, it just became the norm.”

Weaver was one of hundreds of fi rst re-sponders who arrived in the most devas-tated areas just minutes after the storm. Many of them remained there for days, go-ing home only long enough to shower and force sleep to overcome adrenaline.

Very few, if any, police offi cers, fi refi ght-ers and paramedics here had ever experi-enced a disaster on such a large scale. In-stinct and training kicked in, many said,

and helped create some kind of order dur-ing the chaos. Rescuing some victims be-fore it was too late countered some of the helplessness of not being able to save ev-eryone, some said.

Weaver is one of the Sheriff ’s Offi ce’s deputies trained to monitor weather. He began in the Alabama Highway 69 South area and drove east just ahead of the path. He stopped when he got to Crescent Ridge Road.

“I realized that I couldn’t keep going and staying ahead of it, so I went into rescue mode,” he said. “I could still see it moving

STAFF PHOTO | MICHELLE LEPIANKA CARTER

An EF4 tornado moves across the skyline in Tuscaloosa on April 27, 2011. The tornado touched down near Interstate 359 near downtown Tuscaloosa.

SEE RESPONSE | 2F

Page 3: Tornado coverage

down Shaw Drive.” Weaver began checking in-

side homes on Crescent Lane and found bodies in some houses.

“I was walking to the next house when a woman ran up screaming that her baby wasn’t breathing,” he said. “Nobody was there except for myself and another dog handler. We put them in the car and fought our way to the hospital. We were doing some rescue breathing, and the baby started screaming as we approached DCH.”

Weaver returned to the area and continued to search homes and set up a command area.

“You can’t really think about it, you just do it. There were three of us out there, three dep-uties who work three different shifts, and we just did it. There was no talking, it was just im-plied. You do what you’ve got to do.”

Tuscaloosa Police Sgt. Kip Hart said that people in the area where he was working re-sponded in the same way.

He had taken shelter in a friend’s basement on Bear Creek Road and headed toward the center of the city as soon as the storm passed.

“I came down McFarland (Boulevard) and got onto 15th Street, looked over and saw that Cedar Crest basically wasn’t there anymore. Nothing was there anymore,” he said.

A young man lay dead in the wreckage of a home he fi rst ap-proached. As a longtime homi-cide investigator, Hart’s fi rst inclination was to stay with the student, to ensure his body was identifi ed, transported and his family contacted. But Hart soon realized that there was no time for that, and other people needed his attention.

“I realized that it was going to be a rescue effort, as op-posed to a recovery effort,” he

said. “I had to cover him up, try to protect his body and mark where he was.”

Hart and a doctor who had arrived found two injured stu-dents in the house, hoisted them onto doors and met a man who was driving a truck down the road. They loaded the stu-dents onto the truck, took the man’s chain saw and continued to search the debris for more survivors.

Hart later went to Alberta, where he picked up another of-fi cer who was walking down 25th Street East, made impass-able by debris. They began searching around Seventh Street, where they found a woman and two children, all dead in a backyard. They noted their locations and kept mov-ing.

“There was nothing we could do for them,” he said.

They later came upon a woman trapped underneath the wreckage of an apartment building. Other police offi cers, fi refi ghters and the woman’s neighbors worked for two or three hours to free her.

“I’m not even sure what time that was. Our fl ashlights were running out of batteries. We’d cut a hole through some of the walls, and some investigators climbed down there to be with her. Someone fi nally found a f loor jack from a nearby ga-rage, jacked the walls up to help pull her out, get her on a gurney and out of there,” he said.

A f ter the rescue, Har t worked to establish a collec-tion site where workers took the bodies they found. He helped photograph the victims so their family members could later identify them and docu-ment where they had been found. Around 2 a.m., he made it back to Cedar Crest, where he had marked the location of the fi rst victim he had found.

“He was the first person I found, and the last one I recov-ered,” he said.

Hart was fi nally able to stop for a few minutes and take stock of the situation when he went to the morgue at Tusca-loosa Veterans Affairs Medical Center during the early morn-ing hours.

“There were 27 bodies that night in the morgue. Being in there is when I realized just how bad this was,” he said.

Hart said he believes the ca-sualties would have been even worse if people had not been watching weather forecasts and heeding warnings of bad weather that had been broad-cast all day.

Myoshi Wilder had been in

the basement of the Sheriff ’s Office since 6 a.m. The dis-patcher had already spent most of her shift taking calls about the tornadoes that hit earlier in the day.

The fi rst calls that came in were from people in Fosters, who watched as the mammoth twister made its way toward the center of Tuscaloosa.

“A few minutes later, calls started coming in from the Rosedale area, Forest Lake, Midtown, Cedar Crest and Holt,” she said. “We could tell the exact path as it was go-ing.”

The fi rst calls reported that all of Rosedale Court was gone. People were injured; others were trapped.

“There were a lot of injuries. And, of course, people couldn’t see any addresses, so we could only document the general area where they were and try to send offi cers to them,” she said.

Dispatchers help people in distress every day, she said.

“You don’t usually think about anything because you have to put emotions aside and do the job. Then, after every-thing is over, you kind of feel it,” Wilder said. While some people have gone back and lis-tened to the terrifying calls from that day, Wilder hasn’t. They’re already etched into her memory.

“Going back and reliving the voices, what people were say-ing about what they’ve seen ... that’s hard,” she said.

Edgar Calloway, director of operations for NorthStar EMS in Tuscaloosa, said that addi-tional paramedics had come in to work that day, in anticipation of the storm.

His role was to make sure

everything went as smoothly as possible in the aftermath. He drove all over town to fi nd diesel fuel for the ambulances and food for the crews. He made sure there were plenty of tires to replace the ones punc-tured by nails and other debris.

“We had mechanics chang-ing tires on the ER ramp at the hospital, like they do at the races,” he said.

Calloway set up outside the hospital and helped direct emergency workers into the correct entrance, based on their injuries. More than 1,200 people would be treated at DCH before the sun rose Thursday.

“It was total mayhem in the ER at 9 p.m. People every-where,” he said. “I went back at 9 a.m. the next day, and you couldn’t tell anything had hap-pened. They had seen every-body, treated and discharged them.”

He said the emergency re-sponse to the disaster was one of the most successfully exe-cuted he’s seen during his years as an emergency ser-vices provider.

“First, we knew it was com-ing and everybody was pre-pared,” he said. “Second, peo-ple from all agencies in the county had all worked together at a disaster preparedness class recently and knew what to do. Third, the relationships that we all have made it easy to work together. It was just like what we do every day, just more of it. It was a unique experience.

“I hope I never witness any-thing of that magnitude again. It’s almost overwhelming — it is overwhelming.”

Reach Stephanie Taylor at [email protected] or 205-722-0210.

RESPONSECONTINUED FROM PAGE 1F

STAFF FILE PHOTO | MICHELLE LEPIANKA CARTER

Oma Phurrough, 97, is transported through the damage on 15th Street after her home was destroyed on April 27. COMING SUNDAY: Read more about her story in the final installment of our special “Year of Recovery” section.

‘HUDDLED IN A FREEZER’

When me and my co-workers huddled in a

freezer in the back of the store and when

we came out and saw all the damage, we all

knew it was a miracle that we survived.

COURTNEY CARROLL, WHO WAS AT WORK AT MILO’S ON APRIL 27

LEFT: Milo’s restaurant, shown in the center on April 28,

2011, was destroyed in the tornado.

STAFF PHOTO | DUSTY COMPTON

OnlinePART 1 OF 3

Inside

Coming up

Tuscaloosanews.com

An interactive 360-degree view of tornado damage.

Aerial video and photo gallery of the recovery effort.

Time-lapse video of recovery in several heavily damaged locations in the area.

Side-by-side video comparisons of affected areas shortly after the storm and nearly one year later.

High-defi nition Gigapan photos, photo galleries and video taken of the affected areas after tornado.

TREATING THE INJURED: Medical staff members recall the rush of patients and the scene on the night of April 27, 2011. 3F

TIMELINE AND PATH: See what happened on April 27, 2011, and the path the EF4 tornado took. 6F

BEFORE AND AFTER: See photos of the affected areas and how they have changed during the past year. 7F

ON SATURDAY: A look at how the area has coped during the past year’s recovery ef-fort — the charity and help the area received and the truth behind common rumors.

ON SUNDAY: See where Tuscaloosa and West Alabama are a year after the tor-nado, the mental effect on residents, what’s happening with the affected area schools and how Joplin, Mo., has recovered from its tornado.

FILE PHOTO | JASON HARLESS

Tuscaloosa firefighters search a business for survivors after a tornado leveled the Cash Depot on 15th Street on April 27.

A family is assisted by emer-gency re-sponders near 15th Street on April 27, 2011.

STAFF

FILE PHOTO

DUSTY

COMPTON

2F FRIDAY , APRIL 27 , 2012 | THE TUSCALOOSA NEWS

Page 4: Tornado coverage

‘it looked like a bomb exploded’My father was terrified of storms so

he built our 1950s-style home very strong and secure. When we heard that a large tornado was heading our way, me, my sister, and my nephew and niece along with our puppy headed for the walk-in closet in the middle of the house. We heard a deafening noise, and felt the house shak-ing and a lifting sensation going on. We

heard a large bam and I told my sister that a tree either fell on the house or on my car parked in the driveway. After what seemed like an eternity, we slowly opened the front door. We were faced with a huge pine tree on the house. Half the front porch was de-stroyed. We got out into the driveway and looked around. It looked like a bomb had exploded. Huge trees were down every-

where. Our neighbor came running to us to see if we were OK. Suddenly, cars ap-peared out of nowhere, telling us of the devastation all around us. One lady said her house was gone, another said he couldn’t find his family. We left that house to go to our home in Brookwood, but were unable to go because of the trees and power lines down across the road on High-

way 216. We went to our sister’s home be-cause we were afraid more storms would come, and we didn’t know how damaged the house was. The next morning, we went back to the house, wondering what we were going to do. Within five minutes, a truck from the Baptist Association came and started trying to get the tree off the house. Our home was a little off the beaten

path, so no politicians came for photo ops, but people who cared and were there to help came, without fanfare, without cam-eras, without news media. They came from churches, neighborhoods, states as far away as New Hampshire — and they came to offer comfort, caring, food, water and physical man power to help. Pictures don’t do justice to the devastation of land,

property and, most of all, lives lost and the families who have to pick up the pieces and continue their lives. My sister and I were blessed beyond measure, and had that tree not fallen on the roof, we may have been among those who lost their homes and lives. The sign that remains in our front yard today says it all for us: “I will praise Him through the storm.”

Sandra day, who waS at home on april 27

STAff PHOTO | MIcHelle lePIANKA cArTer

above: chris Jordan consoles his fiance, Stephanie Prickett, after the tornado ripped through Tuscaloosa on April 27, 2011. The couple was at Jordan’s apartment at University Downs when the tornado hit.

STAff fIle PHOTO | DUSTy cOMPTON

The path the tornado took across Tuscaloosa can be clearly seen from the air on April 28, 2011.

STAff fIle PHOTO | DUSTy cOMPTON

residents look through debris in cedar crest on April 27, 2011.

STAff fIle PHOTO | DUSTy cOMPTON

A family is assisted by emergency responders near 15th Street on April 27, 2011.

after the storm

STAff fIle PHOTO | MIcHelle lePIANKA cArTer

An American flag waves from a hole in the roof of a home in forest lake on April 29, 2011.

STAff fIle PHOTO | MIcHelle lePIANKA cArTer

Houses sit destroyed in rosedale court.

STAff fIle PHOTO | DUSTy cOMPTON

Volunteers clean debris and rubble from a trailer park near crescent ridge road in Holt on May 4, 2011.

fIle PHOTO | T.G. PAScHAl

left: Members of Alberta Baptist church gather in the parking lot outside their church for Sunday service on May 1, 2011.

STAff fIle PHOTO | MIcHelle lePIANKA cArTer

below: Tuscaloosa Mayor Walt Maddox tours the damage on 15th Street on April 28, 2011.

STAff fIle PHOTO | DUSTy cOMPTON

President Barack Obama meets with Alberta residents ricky McGee, second from left, and his son, ricky McGee Jr., on April 29, 2011.

STAff PHOTOS | MIcHelle lePIANKA cArTer

above: People wander through the damage on 15th Street on April 27, 2011.

left: Metal store signs sit twisted among the rubble along 15th Street on April 27, 2011.

STAff fIle PHOTO | DUSTy cOMPTON

charleston Square Apartments, seen from the air on April 28, 2011, was destroyed in the tornado.

Friday, april 27, 2012 | THE TUSCalOOSa NEWS 5f4f

Page 5: Tornado coverage

‘I WILL ALWAYS BE GRATEFUL’

Anytime I hear a freight train, I think tornado. I will never forget the sound it made as it passed

over me. An offi ce building in Wood Square collapsed on me, and I was buried in the rubble.

It was only by the grace of God that I survived. It was shocking to see the devastation that had

taken place all around me. Landmarks that I grew up with completely vanished. I will always be

grateful to our fi rst responders and city leaders for their decisive actions, having never been

through something like this before. And wow! What a display of how a community can rally to-

gether to help and support each other during a crisis. I think we all learned something that day.

69

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APRIL 27

April 25:Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Okla., issues outlook for severe weather on April 27

April 27, 2:25 a.m.: First tornado watch is issued in Alabama

April 27, 8:10 a.m.: Second tornado watch issued in Tuscaloosa

April 27, 2:40 p.m.: Tornado clips Tuscaloosa and Fayette County line

April 27, 3:41 and 4:15 a.m.: Tornadoes touch down

near Echola and Coaling

April 27, 6:30 a.m.: Tuscaloosa City and County Schools announce that they will be closed for the day

April 27, 11 a.m.: Gov. Robert Bentley declares a state of emergency in Alabama

April 27, 4:47 p.m.: Tornado warning issued for Tuscaloosa County

April 27, 5:08 p.m.: Tornado enter city limits, gaining strength over the Black Warrior River with winds now up to 170 mph, destroying the Tuscaloosa County Emergency Operations Center along Interstate 359

April 27, 5:13 p.m.:Tornado demolishes several small restaurants and stores and devastates the Forest Lake and Cedar Crest neighborhoods along 15th St. E. and McFarland Blvd. E. The tornado crosses University Blvd. to Alberta and Holt, destroying homes, an elementary school, an apartment building and a shopping center.

April 27, 10:30 p.m.: President Barack Obama declares an emergency in Alabama

April 28: Gov. Robert Bentley tours damage, pledges to send 1,000 National Guard troops.

April 30: Volunteers flood city;mayor expects death toll to rise; shelters take in displaced pets

Issued April 27, 2 a.m.

Tuscaloosa

Issued April 26, 2011

Tuscaloosa

Issued April 25, 2011

Tuscaloosa

NOAA Tornado Outlook

Moderate Risk

Slight Risk

Slight Risk

High Risk

APRIL 25 APRIL 26 APRIL 28 APRIL 29 APRIL 30 MAY 1 MAY 2 MAY 3 MAY 4

April 27, 5 p.m.: The mile-wide tornado enters Tuscaloosa near Ralph, packing winds of 125 mph and causing tree damage and minor structural damage

April 27, 8 p.m.: Mayor Walt Maddox describes “utter devasta-tion” and “massive damage” at news conference, saying “This is a dark hour for the city of Tuscaloosa.”

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May 1: Federal Emergency Management Agencyworkers begin registering victims; Alberta Baptist holds service in parking lot of destroyed church

EF4 tornado

May 4: Insurance

commissioner estimates statewide

damage at $2 billion; death toll

climbs to 41 in Tuscaloosa

May 3: List of missing falls

to 80; city estimates

5,000buildings damaged

April 29: President Barack Obama visits,

authorizes disaster relief funds for eight

Alabama counties, including Tuscaloosa

DANNY HUFFMAN, WHO WAS PULLED OUT OF RUBBLE AT WOOD SQUARE ON APRIL 27

LEFT: Hobby Lobby at Wood Square, shown on April 28, 2011, was destroyed in the tornado.

The storm, the response

STAFF GRAPHIC | ANTHONY BRATINA; INFORMATION COMPILED BY KEN ROBERTS

STAFF FILE PHOTOS | MICHELLE LEPIANKA CARTER, DUSTY COMPTON, ROBERT

SUTTON, KELLY LAMBERT; T.G. PASCHAL

FILE PHOTO | KELLY LAMBERT

ABOVE: Tiffany Price collects some of her clothes from her house at Rosedale Court after an EF4 tornado ripped apart the complex on April 27, 2011.

RIGHT: Huston Walters, 20, a sophomore at the University of Alabama from Navarre, Fla., takes a break from cleaning up his home in Forest Lake on April 29, 2011. Walters was taking shelter in his bathroom while talking to his mother, Marisa, on his cellphone. It was the only room in the house left intact.

STAFF FILE PHOTOMICHELLE LEPIANKA CARTER

LEFT: The April 27, 2011, tornado ripped a hole in the side of the Belk department store at University Mall.

STAFF FILE PHOTO | MICHELLE LEPIANKA CARTER

6F FRIDAY , APRIL 27 , 2012 | THE TUSCALOOSA NEWS