TORNADO ALLEY

 TORNADO ALLEY....  it is where I live.  It is in the heartland of the country and also includes a good part of the South.  I grew up having a great respect for storms and spent many nights in the storm shelter.  In my early years, there was a killer tornado that struck in our area at Woodward.  The storm happened on April 9,1947.  Ironically there was another storm 65 years later on April 15 that hit the same city.  This is the town that I visit, if I want to do shopping at WalMart, Dollar Tree, Braums, or Mcdonalds and other places not located in the smaller towns. It is the town where my daughter and her family live.  We have a host of friends there and extended family members that live there, it is our neighboring community. 

Tornado's are not particular where they touch down or what damage they do.  They come out of the clouds in the daytime and night.  Unfortunately this one came at night. The storms were set off in the afternoon of the day and I watched the storm chasers and trackers on TV from early afternoon until 3 A,M,  It was a long day.

I have a son-in-law that is a storm tracker.  He and grandson Elvis were a part of this chase.  They drove hundreds miles on their adventure.  They saw a lot of activity.  This is one of the storms that they watched form and dance across Oklahoma.  I would not want to be in the path of this.  This particular one was in open country and did not do much damage.  Well, I didn't intend for these pictures to be stacked on top of each other but being the technical brain  dummy  that I am, it just happened. Yea,  I got it changed.  

The storms of the day came into our state from the Texas Panhandle and worked across into Kansas.  I have heard it said that there were over 100 tornado's that day in Oklahoma and Kansas.   There were 6 lives lost and many injuries that are critical.  Our hearts and prayers go out to the families who have experienced this tragedy. May God give them comfort and healing.