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Gone but not forgotten-Tuscaloosa Tornado 2011

Some of you who are tweet friends know that I live in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. I’m happy to say that my home was spared, but so many were not. We were without power for 5 days which seems like a minor blip on the radar of what my town is going through.

I can’t even begin to put into words what the past few days have been like. Our church was destroyed, but within hours we had two disaster relief teams parked on our lot and our church members lined up to help. For 5 days it was up at daylight, prepare meals, and carry those meals to the hardest hit areas, other than right there in our church neighborhood. My close friend’s house was destroyed and we spent some time helping her family salvage their belongings.

It’s not easy seeing the military roll into your town. Or having a curfew. But, I’m so glad they are here. They are unobtrusive until they have to be. They are here to protect life and property and they are doing an amazing job. The police force was on the ground within the first hour to help. I can’t say enough about our Mayor Walt Maddox.

As many of you know, I am a very amateur photographer. I have many pictures to share but unfortunately, I can’t look at them right now. I’m still seeing the live versions and I have to make sure that all the pictures do not show loss of life.

There are two pictures that I want to share right off. The first hour I finally got into Tuscaloosa to my friend’s house, I walked around to try to take in what I was seeing. I was highly comforted by what I saw first.

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The second picture was taken the next morning about 9am. This is our church parking lot. The building is gone, but this is just the small scale of the relief efforts. I threw myself into the delivery of aid. It’s unimaginable what you feel when you get a bottle of water to a mother and her infant. I have so many stories to share in the coming days when I finally get all this down.

 

Please bear with me this week. I won’t have much food related content or even running content. My trail half marathon is in two weeks but I have not trained at all since my last long run of 14 miles. I know I’ll be ok, maybe not as fast as I hoped, but I’ll do ok.

For those who asked about me, thank you. I never thought I would see devastation like this. It is so widespread there is no end of it in some communities.

Today, we teachers have the task of calling and locating our kids and hopefully locating missing children from the hardest hit areas. My school was spared, thank God. Others were not.

Verizon Service during Emergencies

Monday 30th of December 2013

[…] friends and family who had damage. We drove into town to start with cleanup. And the next morning, we started disaster recovery and Verizon was in full service. Other services were not. We could NOT have reached the hundreds of […]

Lee

Monday 2nd of May 2011

I'm glad that you and your home and school are okay. It's just devastating seeing all those pictures.

Julia

Monday 2nd of May 2011

I have been checking your blog often to when you would post. I am so sorry that you were there during the tornado. I know so many people were receiving meals from churchs this week and my fiance and his family were so thankful for those meals.

Carol

Monday 2nd of May 2011

Holy Cow! I can't believe what you are faced with. Sending lost of thoughts and prayers your way. Also I can't imagine how you must be feeling about locating your students and students you don't teach...crazy. You will get through it!