The Gulf of Mexico had opened its floodgates. Warm, moist air was blanketing the little town like warm, wet blanket. Even the clouds moved quickly, like they sensed trouble was coming. You could smell New Orleans — and the town was over 200 miles north.
The National Weather Service had issued a PDS (Particularly Dangerous Situation) Tornado Watch. Spring had come to Mississippi. And March was about to roar in like a Lion. Wind chimes rattled in distance, signaling the doom yet to come.
The deputy felt a sense of unease. Bad weather always rattled his nerves. Maybe it was the tornado from the movie from the Wizard of Oz. Maybe it was the hell he had survived on the Gulf Coast during Katrina. But most likely his fear came from the tornado that had destroyed his childhood home. His father’s quick action had saved the family. He could close his eyes and still see his father rushing in the room lit by the strobe lightning. They had made the shelter with moments to spare.
The deputy looked fine on the outside. But there was a 30-year-old scar on the inside that burned on days like this. Surviving the tornado that had killed his friends and wiped out his town gave him a new appreciation (and fear) of the weather.
His radio squawked, “Deputy Jones, you need to come back to HQ. We have another weather briefing.” The Weather Service was taking this potential outbreak very serious. The guys at the Jackson NWS office were pros — they ought to be. They sure got enough experience. “MEMA is on the line, too. This will be a bad day. Make sure your family is safe, too.”
The deputy tried to stay calm. But he felt his insides roaring. The scar was burning. And all he wanted to do was snatch his family and drive a thousand miles away.
The Mississippi Emergency Management Agency’s rep described the unique weather situation that was unfolding. “The same atmospheric dynamics are in play as were during the outbreak that leveled Smithville.” Smithville was the little bedroom community near Amory that got leveled by an EF-5 tornado. EF-5 was practically unsurvivable. You couldn’t hide from a monster like that. The deputy looked at his phone. Radar showed super cells forming in Louisiana. Let the game begin.
He and the Sheriff rode together through town. They’d act as spotters as well as making sure if something bad did happen, order was maintained. Who were they kidding? There is no order after a tornado. He looked at his lunch and decided to pass. His stomach was flat tied in knots. He closed his eyes again and saw his dad running into his room.
At 4:30 p.m., the sirens went off in the town. The lonesome moaning sounded like the souls of previous tornado victims crying out in warning. A funnel had been spotted southwest of town and was moving toward them. The Sheriff and the deputy floored it, causing the V-8 in the 2012 Dodge Charger patrol car to roar like the storm it was about to meet head on.
Some people call tornadoes “the finger of God.” The rope tornado that formed outside of the city limits quickly grew into a hungry monster wedge tornado. By the time it came into town, it was over a mile wide, erasing 100 years of history in seconds. The sheriff and deputy saw the cloud, but didn’t realize what it was until it was too late. The other winds of the storm tossed the car, flipping it several times. The Sheriff’s seat belt broke. He was tossed outside of the car and taken by the storm. His body was found three weeks later in a pond five miles northeast of town.
The deputy woke up upside down and shook his head. Blood trickled down his face, blinding him temporarily. He carefully took inventory of his injuries: Nothing seemed broken. He unhooked his seatbelt and fell to the ceiling of his car. He gingerly crawled out of the crumbled car — how had he survived? He called out for the Sheriff? All he got in return was silence and the smell of broken pines.
He took his shirt and wiped the blood out of his eyes. Television did not do tornado damage justice. As far as he could see, there were broken timbers and broken dreams. He started hearing cries.
It was time to serve and protect.
The first rescue was a lady who had also been in a tossed car. She had a broken arm and severe lacerations on her face. Her friend was dead in the backseat. The deputy closed her eyes and covered her face. He grabbed his radio and called for help. Silence. Then he got ahold of the AMR ambulance paramedic he knew from the donut shop. “I have multiple injuries in the south part of town. Send someone immediately.”
His friend replied, “You need to get to your home immediately.” The deputies heart came out of his mouth. He vomited in a ditch on the side of the road.
The deputy wasn’t a runner, but he could have outran a Kenyan marathoner that day. He’d only stop to check on people he saw in need. But the thought of his wife and little girl fueled his legs. He had to get home now.
When he got to the top of the hill, he saw the monster in the distance that had destroyed his town. “ARRGHHHH!!! DAM’ YOU!” he screamed as he looked at the ruined little down ahead of him. The Courthouse was destroyed. The Police Station, too. The Sheriff’s office was flattened. Cars were tossed like toys and water shot to the sky from broken hydrants. Homes didn’t stand a chance. The school was severely damaged — thank goodness the school district had sent the kids home early. They would have been in buses with the beast hit. Not that they probably fared much better at home.
Then he saw where his house is. Or was. There was nothing but timbers.
The threw up again.
He ran into his yard, stepping a nail and piercing his foot. But he couldn’t have felt pain right now if he had tried. Adrenaline allows mothers to kill bears and children to lift cars. He threw the debris aside with the strength of ten men, all the while screaming the names of his wife and daughter. “Sylvia! Jasmine!” He heard nothing in return.
He smelled natural gas. God, he was about to explode and burn alive. What a perfect ending to a terrible day.
He came to where he thought the bathroom might have been. He continued to throw debris aside. A couple of his neighbors stumbled over to help. All the while the deputy kept calling his family’s names.
Then he found a little hand. Next to it was a bear. A very familiar bear. He grabbed a broken piece of plywood and pulled it aside.
What he saw would haunt him for the rest of his life.
There, protecting his little girl was his wife. Both were bloodied and crumpled. “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!” He screamed.
When he screamed, both the girl and the woman moved slightly. THEY WERE ALIVE! He got back on his radio and called his friend, “Send someone over here immediately! They are alive.”
He checked both. Neither had broken bones. He cradled his little girl and held her in arms like the precious gift she was. He helped his wife sit up and got her a bottle of water. “What happened?” she quietly moaned.
“You apparently are a hero,” the Deputy said to his wife.
“You are bleeding,” she said groggily.
“It’s OK, a lot of us are bleeding. But we survived. The tornado tried to kill us but we’re still here.”
“The weather radio went off. We had about a minute. I heard a roar, threw myself on Jasmine and then nothing.”
“You made most of your minute.” The deputy said to his wife as he saw his friend come running to help. “I have to go and rescue some more folks.” The deputy handed the bear to his battered little girl and said, “Daddy will be home to protect you soon.” And with that, the deputy went back out to rescue more of his fellow neighbors.
The Tornado of 2012 was classified as an EF-4 by the National Weather Service. It stayed on the ground for over 40 miles and had winds approaching 200 mph. It took the life of 13 people, including the Sheriff’s. The deputy was soon elected Sheriff and became instrumental in the rebuilding of the little town. Each home was rebuilt with built-in storm shelters. This tornado had left a scar on the inside of every survivor, just like the storm had of the deputy’s youth. The deputy (now Sheriff) wondered just exactly how terrifying a tornado must have been to the Choctaws and Chickasaws. And he could only imagine how scared the Spanish and French explorers must have been. But he no longer felt fear of tornadoes. He felt a sense of fate now. Mississippi’s weather forged you like iron into steel. When God was ready to take him, He would take him. But right now, he had been given the gift of realizing how fragile life really is.
He had been touched by the Finger of God and had lived to tell about it.
