Springfield Massachusetts Tornado (and debris) 2011
Lots of damage and 4 dead......... Anyone else here from around there? I know my friend with 2 OES was on her way home and sending photos and trying to get home. Her hubby is on the police force so i'm sure he's busy. Said it all looks like a war zone. |
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| I saw the news coverage this morning. 4 dead, but going door to door this morning to account for people. It looks like a real pretty town too. |
| New England is real pretty. Very hard to believe not only that they got a tornado, but it was that large, and that it went thru the city. Stuff like this just does NOT happen in the north east. One of the perks of living up here. |
| They said the one in the NE was an F2. I grew up in Iowa and I can tell you that an F2 can seriously ruin your week. Especially if the area never sees them and the buildings aren't technically built for it. I'm hoping for the best for them That's a stunningly beautiful area and I hate to see what I did on the news. Considering they rarely get this kind of weather, the low number of dead is a blessing in itself. Look at Joplin; they see this all the time and got hammered. This has been a crazy time for weather issues all over. Mother Nature is upset about something... Vance |
| Joan, Mulligan and I spent some time in our basement... My brother lives directly between Enfield, CT and Springfield, MA (which is only 10 miles) and wasn't affected. The storms slid just south of my town all night, then one slid just north of our town. One died out just as it passed north of my house. The tornado that cut a swath through Springfield was on the ground for 17 miles, through mostly rural areas, and it was quite a narrow storm as it cut through Springfield. I haven't seen followup yet in Sturbridge. I hope that historic "Old Sturbridge Village" is OK. Their website won't come up. About OSV: Quote: Old Sturbridge Village celebrates early New England life from 1790-1840. One of the country’s largest living history museums, OSV has historians in costume, 59 antique buildings, three water-powered mills, and a working farm. Visitors can ride a stagecoach, view antiques, tour heirloom gardens, meet heritage breed farm animals, and enjoy hands-on crafts. Open year-round, but hours change seasonally. If you've ever driven from Boston to New York, you've gone by OSV, right off of I-84 near the Mass Turnpike. Our home is kind of pre-disastered. On June 9th, 1953 The great Worcester Tornado (I believe it is the 20th deadliest tornado in the US) stopped after destroying my barn. Well, after destroying the barn that was there before I bought the house without the barn.  Why did so many die? How big was the Worcester Tornado? How long was it on the ground? How wide was the tornado? From Bill Dalton's first-person account: http://billdaltononline.com/uploads/The ... ornado.pdf Quote: At 4:25 P.M., people boating on the Quabbin Reservoir were the first to see the tornado that soon would kill 94 and injure 1,300 people. Heading for Worcester, the storm went through the rural towns of Barre and Rutland. It was growing into a giant storm, becoming a mile wide - one of the biggest or the biggest ever seen. What was equally unusual was that it stayed on the ground for 84 minutes. Most tornadoes touch down and leave little damage. The Great Worcester Tornado traveled 46 miles on the ground and was at maximum power when in punched the city at 5:08 P.M. Worcester was the second largest city in New England, at 200,000 people. It would never be bigger. Emphasis mine.Some people had read the evening papers, which contained the first news of the Flint storm. So little was understood about tornadoes that some readers wondered if this was the same tornado that struck Flint the night before. Others later said they believed the Soviets had dropped an atomic bomb. So dramatic was the air pressure change that it was reported that one man’s chest was blown open when his lungs exploded. A two hundred year old tree, four feet in diameter, was pulled up, roots and all, and went spinning into the sky. Winds exceeded 300 m.p.h. A young man, who was the principal of an elementary school, had just sat down to supper with his family. As a Marine, he had fought through much of the vicious Pacific Campaign in World War II. The tornado killed him. Assumption College in Worcester was hit, and several faculty members died. The Burncoat Hill area was devastated, but the Great Brook Valley neighborhood was leveled, and many houses disappeared. Forty people died there. A municipal bus was picked up, rolled over several times, and thrown against an apartment building. The Brookside Home Farm, a city-owned dairy, was destroyed, killing 6 men and 80 Holstein cows. The storm continued through Worcester and ended in Southborough at 5:45 P.M., precisely the moment the weather bureau finally issued a tornado warning. My neighbor had been in his house when the storm ripped off the second floor and "threw him in a tree" according to his wife's account. They didn't have insurance on the newly built home, so they just put a roof on what remained. She passed on a few years ago, but I was doing some 'net surfing a few months ago and came across a story of the 53 tornado and sure enough, Gordon was listed as a resident who was in the hospital: http://freepages.history.rootsweb.ances ... ornado.htm Quote: Gordon Johnson, 48, Middle road, Southboro, at Union Hospital, back injuries, possible skull fracture and internal injuries I guess she was understating it a little bit. |
| Glad you are ok Ron. We have family in Springfield. So far we have not reached them. I was born in Leominster. Love the area! I did not know of the tornedo in Worchester. So sorry to hear of the deaths. Wow. |
| I just saw an interview with a woman from Munson, MA. Her home was absolutely gone. Missing. Just the stone foundation and a few things in the basement remain. Just poof. Of course she was thankful she was not home at the time of the tornado. She says she doesn't care about all of her Lenox china (the Lenox factory is right nearby). She's just thrilled that her family is fine. She has a coffee shop in Sturbridge (I guess she was there). She got a call this afternoon at her coffee shop from a woman in Milton, MA that they had found a box of her checks (I guess they were coffee shop checks, she must have had an office in her home). Milton is 75 miles as the checkbook flies from Munson. By road it's over 100. A receipt from her milk supplier was found in Upton, 50 miles as the receipt flies. |
| An arborist at a private estate in Sherborn, MA has found about 10 pieces of paper strewn across his trees. They were doing a spot on him. The first piece he showed was.... A receipt from a coffee shop in Sturbridge! Immediately I realized this must be from the same woman from above. The anchor also commented (paraphrased) "we just did a story on a woman with a coffee shop in Sturbridge, perhaps that's hers too." He also had a check written "by a woman in Monson". Sherborn is about 60 miles as the receipts fly from Monson. All of this woman's financial records must have been just sucked right up into the vortex and dropped far away. The man also had a bunch of "treasure chest" type of items - children's homework papers from the 70's, love letter from 1952. I wonder if those also belong to the same woman... |
| Current count: 200 (!) structures total loss. West Springfield: 88 structures destroyed. Springfield: 35 total losses. Monson: 77 total losses and counting (Governor's emphasis). Monson has about 8,500 residents. So 77 is a huge percentage of their homes are destroyed. http://www.monson-ma.gov/Public_Documen ... Docs/facts |
| So glad all is well for you Ron! So sorry for all the people who have been through these terrible storms. Unusual weather pattern to say the least! |
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