Emerson Ave Tornado 52211 Part One

We were home when the tornado hit. I was on the landing on the basement cleaning the litter box. Romie was "helping me". I knew there was a tornado watch all day but when I had gone down there a few minutes earlier everything seemed normal outside. I had just finished my job - literally, and the siren went off. I threw the dirty litter bag on top of the box and said "Romie, we have to go downstairs". I got up from my stool and headed down. Joanne yelled from upstairs "that's the siren." I said, "I know, we're going down now - meet you there." The basement carpet was wet from all the rain (I'm not sure why, but the heavy rain all that day caused some water to get down there). Romie just had ballet slippers on. I picked her up and set her across the main room of the basement onto a couch. The power went out. I yelled to Joanne "Get Romie's shoes and a flashlight." She yelled back "OK" and I heard her stomping around up there, and calling the dog. I'm not sure what happened next but something - a noise or a sense or something - and I decided where we were in the basement wasn't safe. Or maybe Jo had come down with the shoes and ran back up for something - I can't remember. But something was wrong and I decided I needed to get Romie to the inner room of the basement. We were on our way there, as Jo came down the steps. In front of us, the basement window blew. It pushed our 2 rows of 4 block glass bricks out and broke the glass behind it. The blocks flew into the air and dropped several feet from the window. The air pressure change caused the window on the other side of the room (right above where we were on the couch) to push out. Jo was one step away from being on the basement floor - right in front of that window that that blew. If she had been seconds quicker those glass blocks and the broken glass behind it would have hit her. Rain and wind were rushing through the window in a horizontal sheet - bringing small pieces of debris with it (and the top of a solar light from our front garden). Romie started SCREAMING in fear and shock. I was yelling at Jo to "get down here, get down here." What I didn't know, was that she felt the tornado and her ears had popped from the pressure change. She had the sense that had she been in front of that window that the tornado would have tried to suck her through it. (It's just a little foot high, two foot long basement window). She waited seconds until that was clear, while yelling at me "get her in there - get her in there" pointing to the small room in the basement where I was headed with Romie initially. I moved in there and sat Romie on the bed, Romie crying, and Jo followed us in. I grabbed a blanket and covered Romie's lap as comfort and we tried to talk calmly to her and reassure her that she was safe.

The rain was coming down there was this constant roar and then it was quiet. Jo disappeared, saying "tornadoes don't come back." I said I knew, but I wanted it to be clear first, and I didn't know if there could be another one in the cell. She disappeared and came back a few times - she couldn't sit still. She'd come back dripping wet. I heard her up stairs yelling "Oh My God. Oh My God." I thought perhaps the upstairs was gone. I didn't want leave until it was for sure safe, because of Romie. She came down and told me that the backyard was gone, we were definitely hit by a tornado and there was devastation. Sometime in there the sirens started, lots of emergency vehicles emerging on the area. I'll never forget that sound.

We went up and looked out the backyard. Everything was all over, like the backyard had been tipped up side down and shaken before being set right. Romie started crying again "my swing set - my swing set." We went out front. There were trees all over the street. The contents of porch were strewn about, much of having blasted out the porch door onto our stoop. We had to step over all that to get to the street. Everyone else seemed to be there too and we stood in the middle of the street with our neighbors, in shock. Then asking each other if everyone was OK and getting to asking if anyone had checked on the people in that house or that house. We'd be in and out. Rain would drive me back in with Romie. And three separate times while we were out there were gunshots - they sounded like they were a block north of us or so. We'd all scatter and a few minutes later, like magnets, everyone would come out again. The fist time that had happened Joanne had left to look for some of our backyard furniture. She couldn't get her phone to work to take photos - so had taken my phone. She left in the direction of the gunshots. I was terrified - she was gone, I didn't know if she was shot - and I had no phone. I went in the house and yelled at the dog just as Jo came in the back, fine, "Diane, I was no where near that."

Maybe a half hour later the sun was out. We were all outside. And a single female firefighter came walking up the middle of the street, climbing over tree trunks that were across the road. A minute or two later another one. They did not look at us or talk to us and I have no idea where they were going or what they were doing. Then a group of six followed. They walked past, and were gone.

A short time after that the parade started. People walking up and down the street - in a daze, checking things out, checking on each other, talking. We were trying to get information from people. I asked a young couple if there were injuries. They said "there's a dead guy on the corner up there and yeah - a lot of injuries on that next block. I was alone with Romie. She looked at me and said "is that a real dead guy?" I said, no honey, she didn't mean a real one, let's go in the house. Later when we came out, mixed with the neighbors walking up and own were opportunists - people handing out cards, I can fix your house, I take care of damage, I work with insurances, are you the home owner - here's my card. Maybe 6 of them total came up to me, some in uniforms some not. Then the gawkers, street lined with cars, people taking pictures. At one point a white family in a mini van parked in front of us, got the kids out with their strollers and sippy cups while a 4 y/o climbed a down tree (very dangerous) in the neighbors yard. The mom was unphased. My sense was that they were at a festival - she had come to see the damage with her family as entertainment. At one point a black family walked up the street. Two adults, the man carrying a newborn, a 6 y/o walking with them. I asked if they were OK. He said "yes, we're checking on my family up a few blocks, can't get through. Then he looked me right in the eye and said "what about you - are you all OK?"

You have to understand, thee timing of these events may be way off. From the moment we came out of the house to dark I'm not sure of what happened when. It was all so surreal and confusing. At one point a city bus was apparently trying to get though at the corner, had gone up on the curb to pass debris, and got stuck. Somehow it ended up across the entire block - blocking traffic for hours. It was weird to look up the street, covered with tress, and see a bus across the road. And the first house on our side on the next block - no roof - the top south portion of the building gone. Our block was cleared within a few hours, before the bus blocked it again, by neighbors with chain saws. It wasn't cleared cleared, but there was a path through it.

Hours later, after my sister had braved the traffic to come get Romie, I was sitting in the van, people still streaming by in slow motion, and a biker rode in front of me. It looked like a friend from Toastmasters. I yelled "Sarah". It was her, and she stopped. She assured me she was safe and came in with me to look at the damage in the backyard. She had been in NE when the tornado hit and had been trying to get back to her house on the Northside but couldn't get through. She left her car, and walked home on foot - a few miles - and had gone back there with her bike in the hopes of getting her car home. She realized though that it wasn't going to happen, and she'd have to bike back there in the morning for it.

Oh, and my cat. While we were in the basement we heard a meow. Jo had brought the dog down, but didn't bother to attempt with the cat. She said she thought Isis was down there. I wasn't sure - we had two open basement windows and there are stray cats in the neighborhood - one could have come in for shelter. After it was over - I couldn't find her. I called and I looked and no Isis. I was terrified she had gone out one of those basement windows and I didn't know what would happen to her out there with all that devastation or if she'd be able to find her way back in the mess. I thought she was gone. A half an hour later I searched the house again. She was laying on the bed in the basement, in the exact spot I had sat Romie down. She was curled up, purred when she saw me. I was so relieved I can't even tell you.

At one point I was in the van trying to communicate with various people by text message cause the phone wasn't working for calls in or out, and a neighbor two doors down came up to me, asked me where the 4th precinct was located. He had called the red cross for shelter and was told to go to the 4th precinct. I knew it was on Plymouth, somewhere near NorthPoint, but I doubted myself and wasn't sure exactly where it was. I texted two friends that have partners who are police officers for the City, and one wrote back with an address. I gave it to him, saying "it's a 2-3 mile walk." He had two teenagers and two preschoolers. I offered him a stroller, and he accepted that offer a half hour later and walked away, female partner and 4 kids at his side, joining the parade of people walking the debris filled streets.


The other sound that started early and was almost constant for two days was helicopters circling. They were very loud. That first night they went until 11:00 or 11:20 and started back up at 6:00. A neighbor commented that they had already gotten plenty of pictures of our destruction, why did they have to keep circling. It was really loud starting at 9:30-10:00, and I assumed they were getting ready for "live" shots on the 10:00 news.

By late Sunday Chad had made it through. He brought ice to keep our refrigerator cold, and several LED lights and batteries (though we had batteries). He told us we were on a curfew as of 9:00 and people would not be allowed in North Mpls without ID showing we lived there. At 9:00 the sirens went off. I thought maybe there was another tornado warning, but it was short lived, and we guessed it was to mark the start of curfew. I thought it odd to put us on a curfew when we didn't even know about it. Again, all across the metro except for in North there was power, so people knew what was going on for us, but we didn't know. Chad also told us there was talk on twitter of a some residents planning to riot, and of the city police trying to get riot gear and a request for national guard to come in and keep the peace in North Minneapolis. I don't know how much of that was true, but probably most of it was fear-based rumor. Other than the gunshots much earlier in the day, all was peaceful and quiet, again, with the exception of chainsaws. Jo and I had easily made the decision hours earlier to stay put, to guard our property. Romie was gone and safe, we had water, food, and plumbing, and saw no good reason to leave.