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Storms

Posted 05.10.06 at 1:53 PM

In this season of spring storms, I’m reminded of tornado in ‘82, which predated (but not by much) the installation of warning sirens in Paris. In April I usually drag out “the tornado book,” a huge album which has every scrap of news coverage printed about “our” tornado, and put it on display in the archives, and it still receives a lot of interest.

At that time, I lived at the end of Smallwood Road near Elk Hollow Golf Course,  and my parents and I stood in our front yard and watched the funnel pass between our house and U.S. 82 East. We saw it hit Paris Lumber Company in the distance and literally toss it up in the air. I remember police cars touring the city with sirens blasting full force—I was on my way home, passing through the Tudor St. area, and I couldn’t imagine why they were blowing their sirens. When I got out on the loop, I noticed the wall cloud, and I thought, “Oh, my goodness, that’s a bad looking cloud.” I parked and even got out of the car to look at it, and I was standing there gazing at it when an enormous dark column just dropped out of it. I could see the circular rotation on the outer fringe of it (it was not a “funnel” when I saw “my” tornado).

I jumped back in the car and streaked for “home,” and I was in great danger of being struck not by the tornado, but by other motorists. People were fleeing and trying to get home—it was about 4 p.m. I remember standing out in our front yard, after I got home, and watching the thing go past about a mile or two south of us. Almost immediately, the electricity went off and the phone lines went dead. We listened to the news on the car radio for a while. I also remember that immediately after it passed, the hardest rain I’ve ever seen fell for several minutes; it was like a solid curtain of rain. I waded through it to the barn to check on my saddle horse, and he was very calm.

Imagine our great surprise when, shortly after, my aunt pulled into our driveway for a visit! She had followed the storm from Bonham and passed through Paris immediately after it had hit the city. How she got through downed power lines without getting electrocuted, I’ll never know. She’s from Montague County, though, and if you notice on the news, Montague County is used to bad weather! Their citizens are pretty intrepid and not easily given to panic. My brother arrived from Denton later in the evening—he couldn’t get through on the phone, and the news he’d heard was that Paris had been “wiped out.”

I rode a lot in those days, and for months after the storm, we had to be very cautious because of roof shingles, still with nails, that werejust everywhere that we rode, along with pots and pans. It was unimaginable how much debris was picked up and then dropped by the cloud, often miles away.

Have you ever noticed how people react to storm warnings? After the sirens were installed, they were blasting away one afternoon, and the trees were bent double outside, and I, who live in an upstairs apartment, fled downstairs to shelter with a good friend who was in her late 80’s at the time. “Oh, that (name withheld). He blows the sirens if there’s a little breeze.”

I also have a friend originally from Kansas, and the tornado is not uncommon in Kansas, as we know. “Toto, we’re not in Kansas any more!” They must have a more cavalier attitude because she considered a miss as good as a mile and didn’t get alarmed at all. Here at PJC, we have designated shelters, depending on where you are on campus, but I’ve noted in the past that most stand outside gawking at the clouds. Students from faraway places are excited and want to “see one.” However, when you see a tornado “up close and personal,” you’ll find that the fascination is fleeting.

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