Memories of June 16, 1992

Twenty years later, that day still seems close, there I'll admit I'm sure there are details that have sunk into the recesses of my mind, never to return.  What follows is what I remember about that day and the aftermath of the tornado that struck Chandler and Lake Wilson that night.

The day was hot and humid.  A truly miserable day to be out working.  I can't recall the exact details, but it felt like we were in Florida - a dew point in the 60's for sure.  Dad and I were in Chandler to start the day, painting a small house.  We pushed in the morning to get the place done that day, because we did not want to be there when the day really heated up.  As we were working, the radio was broadcasting advisories about the potential for dangerous storms later in the day.  We finished the house around 2:30.  The plan for Nelson Painting was to start another house in Chandler the next day.  As we were getting ready to leave, I asked Dad if he wanted to drop off our ladders, A-frames, etc. at the next job site.  It wasn't an uncommon practice, but Dad said he'd prefer to just get home.  We went home and got cleaned up. Can't recall doing anything special that afternoon, probably watched the Cubs if they were on.  As the afternoon wore on, there were more and more weather warnings around us, more advisories about the potentially dangerous storms to come.  Dad was a volunteer firefighter and first responder, so we'd get all the watch and warning information from his pager.  

About the time Mom got home from her job, the tornado warning was posted for the tornado as it touched down near Leota.  I was a bit concerned, but Leota was a LONG way away and I thought it would go back up into the clouds.  We got a report about the direction in which the tornado was heading.  I got a bit more concerned at that point as if it stayed on the ground, it would go through Chandler and Lake Wilson.  It was at that point that I started praying.  We listened as the tornado was seen to be approaching Chandler.  I honestly cannot recall if Dad went to do storm spotting before that or just after, I can just recall standing in the dining room of the house, looking out the windows to the south.  The tornado siren sounded.  Mom hated our basement and said she would not go there.  We agreed on the bathroom off of the kitchen.  We kept watching the skies.  We heard that Chandler had been hit and the tornado remained on a path for Lake Wilson. The power went out.  A few minutes later, we could see a wall bearing down on us.  We grabbed the dogs and got to the bathroom.  

I sat there and held Mom's hand, both of us praying.  It seemed like we sat there for a long time, but it was probably less than a minute before the sound - debris hitting the house, the wind, and a loud THUMP that I was convinced was a tree either hitting the house, or the upper portion of the house getting ripped from the house.  Then... it was gone.  We sat there for another minute and ventured out slowly and carefully.  We went to all the windows of the house.  From the back window, could see that the garage had been flattened (heard later that some who saw the tornado SE of town saw some finger tornadoes branch off the main twister - think it is one of those that picked up the garage, moved it 5-10 feet to the north, then dropped it).  We moved to the windows in the dining room - couldn't see any damage, though could see Dad's grill on it's side, moved from the E side of the house to the S.  Then we got to the front door and ventured out.  We could see extensive damage to the west, including a large tree uprooted in the front yard (the tree that had been our "home" for many kickball games when I was younger - it had been the last "base" remaining.  I checked to see if the power line to the house was still attached - it was, so we ventured out.  As I looked to the south, main street of Lake Wilson looked like someone had dropped a bomb on it.  As we started to assess damage to the house and property, Dad came home to check on us.  We found out later that when the tornado hit, he had barely made it into the fire house, was lifted off his feet by the wind, held onto a pipe and made peace with the fact that he would never see us again.  I checked upstairs - the only damage I found up there was that the window in my bedroom had been broken (it was a piece of lava rock from the grill - those rocks were responsible for taking out that window as well as two windows in my parent's van and the back window of my car.  Dad left as there were dozens of things that needed to be done, people who still needed to be checked on, etc.  He had heard of no fatalities, but some serious injuries.  

I walked out to my car and found the rear window was gone.  I grabbed  some duct tape and a roll of plastic.  As I was assessing the damage, my best friend, Eric showed up.  His house had escaped with no damage.  He accounted for some of our friends in town and how they were doing (no injuries, varying levels of damage).  We got the plastic up on my car, then decided to see what we could do to help.  We ended up at the Lutheran church, where Eric and I were members.  I can't recall who had told us to get there, but we got there.  On the way, stopped at the fire house to get more supplies from the back of Dad's truck. The truck had been moved a couple of feet by the tornado and some of the ladders in the back damaged.  As we got to the church, we started to cover up the damaged stain glass windows.  As we were working, we got word (I think from Eric's dad) that another storm was coming and was spawning tornadoes.  Eric and I went into the balcony of the church.  The damage to the stained glass there?  The face of Jesus was missing.  That still freaks me out to think about.  It freaked both of us out at the time.  We finished and went outside to find the skies had once again turned a sickening green.  Eric headed for his house.  I hopped on my bike and took off.  I think there was some hail with the rain, I can recall one of the firefighters yelling at me to get to shelter.  I got home and hunkered down with Mom, though we did not go into the bathroom, just watched from the dining room table.  

Dad came home and told us that the high school in Chandler had been hit.  The impact of that did not hit me immediately - but it was where Dad had worked for years, so it being gone could mean Mom and Dad would need to move somewhere else.  It also meant that the school that I had graduated from two years before ceased to exist.

At 10, I got my boom box/tv from my room and found some batteries to fire it up.  Jay Trobec was on with a live broadcast from Chandler.  He said the town had been evacuated (not true).  If you see the coverage from KELO that night, you see a shot of Lake Wilson's main street.  Eric and I are working on my car in the background.  We crowded around the small tv and got our first look at the damage in Chandler.  Also heard that yet another storm would be coming through.  Mom insisted at that point that I sleep on the living room floor rather than my bed.  We also got word about some people looting about this time.  We made sure to lock the doors.  I had a bat next to me while I tried to sleep.  Sleep did not come.  It was too quiet, the only sound from the fire trucks and rescue vehicles that patrolled the streets.  The National Guard arrived to provide security.  I don't recall exactly when Dad got home to stay, but once he was home, I went to my room and got a few hours of sleep.  

The next morning, Mom went to work in Edgerton, Dad went to do things related to his position on the city council.  I started about getting some things salvaged from the garage, then started to clean up the glass from my room.  As I was working on that, I heard someone come into the house and holler an inquiry if anyone was home.  It was my brother, Mark and his wife, Shannon.  Mark had watched the news the night before and was unable to get in touch with anyone to see if we were okay.  He had wanted to drive down that night, but waited until the next morning.  Mark, Shannon, and I went for a walk around town and documented some of the damage.  We prepared some food for lunch (wanted to use what we could from the freezer while we could - Dad's grill still worked, just had none of the rocks in it).  After lunch, we cleaned up the yard.  Dad had an old logging saw that we got out.  We went to work on the big tree.  A crew (including Eric) doing clean up went by and gave us crap about the saw we were using, how long that would take, etc.  As they got out of sight, another crew stopped and a couple of guys with chainsaws make short work of the tree.  When Eric's crew came back, Mark and I were flexing and showing what we had done.  Mark and Shannon headed back to South Dakota.  

Dad ended up helping man the barricades that were erected to stop sight seers from driving into the town and getting in the way of clean-up crews (I think Mark and Shannon had to walk in as they were not allowed in).  Dad got called a lot of vile things from the people who thought it was their right to come into town.  People would lie to him about property that they owned in the area.  When they were sent away, they would try to find other ways into the town.  My recollection is that many of those vehicles had Iowa plates on them.  I have to admit that when there was major flooding in IA the following year, I felt little pity.  I will point out that I did NOT go to Iowa to get in the way.  Dad was also meeting with county, state, and federal officials as part of the city council.  

The next day, I joined the crew that Eric was working with.  Got to work with Eric, his parents, our friend Dan, and a bunch of others.  We'd arrive at a site where the chainsaws were rumbling and would load up debris, branches, etc. onto a flatbed.  Once it was full, we'd head out to the town dump, unload, and head back to town to repeat the whole thing.  It was incredible to see how everyone in the are pitched in to help.  There were several clean-up crews working through-out the day, basically sun-up to sun-down.  The only thing that slowed us down was flat tires (happens when houses and buildings are destroyed), chain saw break downs, and people from outside the area trying to find a "back way" into town.  One elderly couple were treated to Dan mooning them as we passed on the narrow country road.  Dan also managed to get a song lodged in my head - "Achy Breaky Heart".  Ugh.  As we were picking up debris, he would sing the song.  With no power in the house, had few options to counter it, so would fall asleep with the song echoing in my brain.  

I think it was later in the day on Thursday that I rode over to Chandler with Dad, got my first look at the devastation there.

I believe it was also on Thursday that Mom, Dad, Eric and I went to the company where Mom working in Edgerton.  They had built an  employee fitness center - complete with locker rooms and showers.  Actually felt human by the end of the night.  It was so weird coming back to Lake Wilson, cresting the hill and seeing nothing but darkness.

Oh, I also think Thursday (maybe Friday) is when my uncle Rich and aunt Pat came down with a new generator for us to use.  Dad got our fridge going and ran a cord so our neighbor could do the same.  We were still doing meals at the Legion, but it was nice to have some minimal power back in the house.  

Friday morning, I was back at it with the crew.  By noon, we were out of commission again d/t the flat tires.  We asked around to see if there were other places we could be, other things we could be doing.  Finding nothing, we decided to go out to the cemetery outside of town to survey the damage there.  A group of us (I think Dan, Eric, Jon, and myself) walked out to the cemetery.  As we were walking, we started singing the theme to the television show "Mr. Ed" ("A horse is a horse of course, of course")  As we started be past a pasture on the outskirts of town and saw a horse that had died in the storm.  That ended the singing.  The cemetery had taken a significant hit, but there were still trees and headstones standing.  We then reported back to town (Dad).  It was another thing, another place added to the list that kept growing.  The debris pile outside of town kept getting larger and larger, but it seemed as though we weren't ever going to get to the end of cleaning up what the storm had left behind.  Late in the day on Friday, a large group of volunteers from Adrian arrived with chainsaws, fresh people, and a desire to help their neighbors.  They descended on the town - some areas were cleared only enough for equipment to get through.  That group finished cutting everything.  Was like watching a band of benevolent locusts swarming the town.  They even had a crew out at the cemetery.  They cut, they hauled, and when they left, the big items left behind by the storm were gone.  Dad saw what they had done and got a bit misty.  They were a godsend that day, that is for sure.

Saturday was spent doing smaller clean-up - picking up smaller sticks and branches - not working with a crew, was working with Eric and a pick-up.  Mom went to the school gym to help sort through the donations that had flooded into the town (a tip, don't use a disaster to get rid of your torn and stained stuff - there were some nasty clothes and household items donated.  There was some talk about the town maybe getting power back before the end of the weekend.  Eric and I ended up going to Batman Returns that night.  Was good to get away for a bit.  

Sunday started with a church service.  I think it was a community-wide one at our church, but am not clearly remembering that.  The service was lead by our pastor, who asked people to share thoughts, feelings, and memories of the storm.  Prior to the service, he had asked a few people to talk and try to get the dialogue started.  It was a good idea - a kind of debriefing of events.  Problem was that the people he had planted spoke (including Mom) but few others did.  Probably not the right place for a big ole counseling session.

On Sunday, I started to clean out the glass and debris from my parent's van.  They had a conversion van with huge windows, two of which were broken.  I vacuumed several times, made a duct tape roller (think a hyperactive lint roller), and finally ended up running my hand across the carpet to ensure all the bits of glass had been pulled up.  Did the same with my car.  I think it was the middle of the following week when someone came and installed new windows.  They did a poor job with the rear window in my car - every time it rained, the floor behind the passenger seat would fill with a couple inches of water.  Unfortunately, after the storm, it rained a LOT the next 2 years.  Felt like the storm had changed the weather patterns.

Things gradually got back to normal.  Many homeowners with minor damage got money to replace windows, re-roof, and, in some cases, to repaint their homes.  This lead to a bunch of work for us for the remainder of that summer, into the next.  Nelson's Painting ended up bringing Eric on board to help us make a dent.  The town continued to heal.  Meetings were held and decisions made regarding the school.  The barricades came down.  Flat tires continued to be commonplace for about another month (think I ended up with a total of 3 that summer).  Dad found out he still had a job, would just have to figure out how he'd fit in to a different school.  Eric and Dan were part of a graduating class that were the last to walk the halls of Chandler-Lake Wilson high school.

Prior to the tornado, the Lake Wilson Community Players were getting ready for their 10th anniversary - a revival of the play that had started the group during Lake Wilson's Centennial (which we've since found out wasn't really the centennial).  As a group, we decided "the show must go on."  We pushed things back a week, but we put on a show for the people of the area.  

I don't believe there have been any long-lasting effects for me related to the storm.  An intense interest in traumatic stress related to natural disasters and how to treat PTSD.  Saw lots of people impacted in many different ways by the storm - adults, the elderly, kids.  I know that when the storm hit, my thoughts were immediately for the safety of my family, then my close friends, then it kept going out - a ripple effect.  Helped clarify who and what are important.  We lost a garage (which gave Dad a project the following summer) and a few windows.  We came through the storm relatively unscathed and for that, we were blessed.  Within a few months of the storm, we found out that Mark and Shannon were expecting.  More blessings.  

 In the spring of 1993, I was part of a crew with Eric and his parents again.  This time, we were helping to plant trees around Lake Wilson to replace those lost by the storm.  I've not been back to town since Dad moved out, but during previous visits, I could look at those trees as a testament to how the community was knocked down but got up again (cue Chumbawamba)