West Liberty, Kentucky Leveled by Tornado!

Originally posted by EvolEric
reply to post by signalfire

 

Poor area...
Not tornado alley

Never has this happened here before...

If these areas rebuild it will be a miracle...

Most cant afford insurance...

I know when i wake up on a typical day a tornado is the farthest thing on my mind...

We have had our share of tornados in the past here in Eastern Kentucky. 1974, 1988, and 1995 come to mind. This was the worse I have seen this close to home maybe scence 1974. Most homes do not have basements because of cost. I wish our house had one, we prepared as best we could and sat out the storm. Wind damage all around us, but thank God we are OK. 519 and US460 leading into West Liberty were still closed as of today, we dropped of loads of clothes and food today heading to West Liberty, and Frenchburg.

Insult to injury we just go 6-8 inches of snow. Heavy wet packing snow. This will delay cleanup and recovery. Over the weekend there were volunteers for finding cats and dogs that came out of hiding and hungry. Just read a fb account, a man had to have rescue and recovery scour his parents property and neighboring property to find his parents. Could you imagine such a daunting task? Thats just a sample of what the survivors and volunteers are dealing with. We woke up Sat morning feeling blessed we were ok, and folks on our street only had damage, nothing compared to loosing whole families. Made donations of seriously a truck load of household items. My mate and I are reviewing our budget and will be purchasing number 10 cans of food for a Community Soup Kitchen who has been asked to feed workers for the next several weeks. I will be volunteering my time, cause I don't have much money, but I can wash pots and pans, cook, and have fed hundreds of people at one time. u2u me if you want to know how you can help even if you aren't close.

The snow knocked out my power sunday morning,
Just now got it back.

My father saw the destruction in Salyersville today...

A tough, stern, mans man... Strong... Was crying after seeing the remains.

He never cries!

Eric
Could you let Kyle know that her grandmother is ok. We could not get her to the basement due to her advanced alzheimer's - she cant walk. We got hit by an EF-1 here about 20 miles from West Liberty and just got power, phone and internet back a couple of days ago. A lot of damage from baseball size hail. All the roofs have to be replaced as well as vinyl siding and some windows broken. Lost my van- parts of it all over the place. The truck looks like someone took a sledgehammer to it so I just had a new windshield put in it. Insurance should cover the damage to roofs, gutters, siding and windows on the houses. Probably about $10,000 worth of damage! Still shook up!!

This is so sad.

I have never before associated Kentucky with tornados but what do I know. What a terrible tragedy. It just goes to show these things really can strike in unexpected places.

There have been very few tornadoes here and never where I live - one county over from West Liberty. At least in my 62 year lifetime. The ones that have touched down in the past were something like EF-0 and usually just tore up a couple of barns. Usually everything east of the I-75 corridor used to be considered pretty safe. The storms hit the mountains and either dissipated or went around us. Not this time.

Just got in from driving through WL, Ezell. National guard still on duty, state and local law enforcement still on duty. Relief centers and churches filled with people in need. Insurance companies with mobile setups. But the drive through the middle of downtown was just more than the brain could process. With an already depressed economic population most can't afford insurance.
The entire downtown is in rubble. Metal twisted, wood beams jutting out at wrong angles. It was hard to grasp how there wasn't any more loss of life than just 7. Salvation Army and Red Cross in both Morgan and Menifee counties seemed to have more need than relief. This puts into perspective one's life and blessings, count yours now and be grateful, and pray for those reeling from the pain.
Learned last night, the missing equipment box from my companions band was mistakenly put into a truck the night of the gig a week before this happened. He lived in Menifee county. That young man came back to the venue told the owners he had it and it looked expensive. (He was right about 1K). Was told they'd be back this weekend. He took them in his house for safe keeping. He lost his roof on his house and his whole garage. Every window on his truck was blown out and extensive hail damage all over it. He watch the tail of the tornado in the valley below swirl around his aunts house who has 3 children. He lost 2 friends in the tornado that were quiet dear to him. In all what this man had to endure in the aftermath of clean up of his and family and friends properties, he brought the equipment box back to the venue last night. Every member of the band and each of the band babes left money for beer and gas in front of him on the bar. He became overwhelmed, said he didn't do it for the reward, but that it was the right thing to do. We were so grateful to him. He was humbled by his experience, you could see that on his face. He was grateful he was JUST ALIVE.

Thank you JD, you have renewed all of our faith in humanity. The worst really does bring out the best in people.