`Tornadoes and Twisters!

This week has been pretty exciting with sirens, tornado watches and tornado warnings!  We are glad that we have a basement to escape to and that we can share with the missionaries in Scott since they live in an upstairs apartment.  On Tuesday, May 24, we had an amazing experience of a tornado coming within about 5 miles of our house so we were able to safely take some wonderful pictures.

This is what we saw just straight out from our back fence.  Since we look out to pastures, it was a perfect view of an awesome and terrifying tornado.  

This must have been over plowed and unplanted cropland for it to spin up so much dust.  

As we watched, it was fascinating to see it change shapes and it whirled around and around.

The tornado was moving in a north east direction and we were happy that it was far enough away we could enjoy snapping pictures safely.  Otherwise we would have been down in our basement and missed all these lovely shots.

Can you see that thin little line of tornado going way up in the clouds?  Amazing!  

We were glad to see it moving away from us as we needed to be on the road traveling to Garden City to teach our institute class there.  After class when we returned to Scott City,  These were the unusual clouds that were left after the tornado went on its way.

We learned that Dodge City had four tornadoes touch down in their area. All three sets of Dodge missionaries happened to be at President Glover's house for dinner (member of the stake presidency) so they were excited to get some great pictures but also to have a safe basement to be in when it got too close.  There were 2 injuries from this tornado but no deaths.

On our way to teach our class in Dodge on Thursday night, we saw the evidence of one of the tornadoes right close to the highway. 

The power poles had snapped off like matchsticks and the power company had several trucks there trying to get new poles up and power restored.  Don't think it will help this family very much though.

This is the pivot irrigation system that they all use here that is connected to a water source and turns in a huge circle to water the crops.  The wheels you see in the air are generally on the ground.  This one has been really twisted by the 'twister' that came whirling by.  You can see a section of fence knocked out and several trees that have been uprooted and are laying on the ground. 

On Saturday we had occasion to drive out to Leoti to the west of us and were able to see some of the damage our tornado had done.  This is what is left of an old wooden barn that had been leaning for decades.  We had commented often that we ought to take a picture of this leaning barn but we missed our chance as the tornado just collapsed the whole thing.

I am sure the farmer who owns this wheat crop was not too happy to see what the tornado did to his wheat which was almost ready to harvest.  

Can you see the big circle of flattened wheat?  I guess the bottom of the tornado was this big as it passed through this field.

There are several feed lots out this way with thousands of head of cattle in them.  I can't imagine what it would do to all of them but I wouldn't want to be there when it was happening.

We feel blessed that we were able to experience a Kansas tornado from a distance but hope that we can finish our mission here in Kansas without getting any closer to one.  We will be glad to return to Arizona where about all we have in the way of weather is just lots of sunshine!