Wednesday, April 27, 2011, was a day of terror and destruction when as many as 16 tornadoes raged through
the Tennessee Valley, bringing injuries and deaths in locations accustomed to occasional tornado watches and warnings, but
rarely to the real thing sweeping through the area in record-breaking multiples.
BY TONEY ATKINS
ROSSVILLE, GA -- The dog I was "babysitting" that week woke me about 8:45 a.m. when she scurried from underneath
the covers where she had been lying next to me and anxiously gazed at the moving curtain on the window of the mobile home.
The wind whistled eeriely as gusts lashed the house with terrifying frequency.
I opened the curtain to a scene that rivaled special effects in disaster movies. Heavy raindrops were chasing
each other through the mobile home park, their race so tightly close that the residences across the street were barely
visible. Tall trees whipped as if in an orgasmic frenzy, their top branches often bending to kiss the ground. As the dog watched
silently, I touched the window pane, which was bending inward with the wind's heavy breathing, and that certainly
did not portend anything good.
Meanwhile, less than a mile away, a grocery store's sign was torn away and a shopping cart sped down the center
of the road, most likely breaking the speed limit, reliable sources told me later that day.
Meanwhile, on a street about a quarter of a mile to my south, huge trees were being uprooted and seemingly
replanted horizontally across the roadways in several areas, yanking electrial wires from their moorings as they fell, killing
electricity to a large number of residents and businesses for many long hours.
This was to be only the first of four or five terribly severe thunderstorms that roared through the area around
Chattanooga, northwest Georgia and northern Alabama during a 16-hour period.
I felt blessed to be alive and unharmed, and Shadow, my loyal dog buddy, obviously did, too. She didn't
leave my side until after the last thunderstorm passed about midnight, although it might be questionable as to who was
protecting whom.
Damage to the mobile home park, just south of the Georgia-Tennessee state line, was minimal and was generally
restricted to underpinning being ripped loose from several residences. The house I was "sitting" suffered no damage. Pieces
of insulation, probably blown from miles away, were stuck to the windows of my car, and parts of roofing and other materials
that weren't from our neighborhoods littered nearby yards.
Other areas were not so lucky. Ringgold, GA, not that many miles east of Rossville, became a scene of utter
destruction, with some deaths reported. TV and still pictures showed devastation unlike any ever seen with such magnitude
in the tri-state area.
The recovery process is just beginning, and communities are coming together to help each other and others who
have lost everything -- homes, family members, friends. It may be months, even a couple of years, before everything returns
to normal.
We in this mobile home park were merely sideswiped and I, for one, thank God. I can now say that, so far, I've
been through hurricanes and a tornado outbreak, but this historic event was about the worst.
A white Christmas, several other snows that disrupted travel and school for happy kids, bitter cold, occasionally
heavy rains, the day of destructive storms and an uncommonly uncomfortable spring and early summer heat wave has made
the weather one of the major topics of conversation in northwest Georgia. Unheard of tornadoes in the shadow of Lookout Mountain
have many wondering what Mother Nature has in store next time.
When the numerous weather radios that have been sold since April 27 sound off with watches and warnings for severe
storms, nerves twitch with anxiety, eyes go to the skies and few take an "it won't happen here" attitude as they once did.
The latter is good, for physical safety may be at stake. Homes and businesses can be rebuilt. People can't.
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