“We were very fortunate and blessed compared to the injuries, fatalities and damages in other areas,” said Emergency Management Director Grant Loy. “We had some trees fall into homes and vehicles but no one was injured.”
Grant said every emergency department was out and assisting with removing debris, cutting trees, and responding to calls.
During Friday night’s storm, there were 10-12 weather spotters out in the county. Rotation was spotted in the Breeding area by four or five spotters who saw what appeared to be funnel clouds or lowering clouds. They were able to visualize them crossing the county for five to six minutes. The same storm moved to Russell County where a funnel cloud touched down a few minutes.
Brandon Harvey, captain of Breeding Fire Department, said that during the storm his department worked with Daniel Wilson to verify in person what Wilson was seeing on radar.
Wilson noted that, “Thanks to the weather spotters and their work, we were able to notify the citizens of Russell County about the funnel cloud. The training they have taken paid off.”
After taking care of problems in Adair, Breeding’s technical rescue team and Loy responded to Russell County and assisted over there throughout the night and on Saturday.
As the storm moved east, a tornado touched down from Russell to Laurel counties, killing at least 19 people. The National Weather Service has ranked the tornado an EF-4, reaching 170 miles per hour and stretching almost a mile wide. It spanned for 55.6 miles.
Adair County does have outdoor tornado sirens that are activated when a tornado warning is issued. These sirens are meant to alert people to take cover and in many areas cannot be heard if you are indoors. Code Red is also available and will send alerts to your phone if you are in an affected area.
By Amy Pike
amy@adairvoice.com
