10th anniversary. Anybody with a story or two?

10th anniversary. Anybody with a story or two?

Just terrified watching it come closer and closer on the news. Stuff falling from the sky, smell of gas, horror at the pictures on the television and frantic prayers for loved ones who were in potentially in the line but I couldn't reach. What a wild, wild day. I drove through the area a couple of days later and was stunned. All that is completely minor compared to the people actually affected, I know.

10th anniversary. Anybody with a story or two?
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May 3rd, 1999. Weather was about like it is today...Cool but not rainy...I was headed to Kansas City and my wife (not afraid of anything) asked me to wait...Looked down the end of the driveway and the whole world looked like it was blowing up. we own a small business office area that was right in the path of the tornado. We took off and got there within 5 minutes after the tornado went through...the debris was still moving around. Luckily our building was completely destroyed but most of our friends, customers and neighbors were without homes and were completely lost. Many people were walking wounded. One young lady came up to the building with two quarters in her hand and asked if she could buy a Coke. No, we said, we'll give you one..."what happened" my wife asked...she said I changed clothes from work, I sat down and took the remote control and hit the button ...when I did that my house blew away and I was on the house foundation with a chair, my television and remote....Did I do something wrong???
There were and are so many stories to tell about the Tornado you just don't know where to stop or start. I remember setting up a command post for all of the different municipalities in the parking lot and we began cooking to feed people the next morning...Before we knew it, people were bringing everything they could so it wouldn't spoil....No gas or electric service we use a couple of big outdoor smokers and any charcoal grille we could find...I remember sleeping less that 10 hours that first week. I remember helping get a lady off the top of her baby in the bath tub...The lady was dead. I remember all the pets and animals that were looking for an owner....But, most of all I remember how the people of Moore dug their heels and began to rebuild almost immediately.....so many stories....so many heroes....Red Cross was there quickly...ham sandwich and a Coke....Sam's Wholesale Club sent us two trailers full of food.....we counted over 10,000 styrofoam plates used to feed with on those days.....Tell some more later....lots of tough memories also...

May 3 is my birthday. My wife, 7 year old daughter, our new puppy, and myself entered our closet underneath a stair well about 2 minutes before the tornado took our entire house on SW 128th street, 2 blocks straight south of Westmoore High School. About 30 seconds after our entire house left, except the closet we were in, we crawled out to what looked like the aftermath of a nuclear bomb. Our lives and many others were changed forever. Happy birthday to me. Today we live in a nicer, bigger house with inground pool, about 11/2 miles southwest of Westmoore. Every day of life is wonderful.
Oh, I remember the weather that day differently. It was sunny and warm with strong winds out of the south. The storms boiled up in late afternoon.

I remember chasing it in my Camaro.

My then fiancee hid in the closet screaming for me to get in.

I wasn't about to let a Tornado get the best of me, so I went after it.

Of course it didn't get anywhere near my parent's house, which is where I was living then. I took 240 to the I-35 junction, where cops blocked my path. I of course found a way around them, and followed it as it hit the GM plant, and eventually del/midwest city.

Of course, when I think about May 3rd, 1999, I think of a life I would end up regretting. I wasn't such a nice person then, and lost a lot, during the latter part of the 90's. Fun times, but from 97 to early 2000, is a time I will never forget, as I live with the regret of knowing I let some good things, go, due to arrogance.

All I thought about all day today, is how there is a past me back then, that was happy, but didn't act like it. Had every reason to be happy. I wish I could go back, and stop myself from making a bad decision.

Not as tragic as some stories from that day, but painful memories nonetheless.

I chilled in a basement at a school for some hours

http://www.okctalk.com/okc-underground/17659-10-years-anniversary.html

We already got one for this. I think mother nature wanted to remind us how powerful she still is with all those clouds today.

I had lived through the 1947 tornado in Woodward, one that had flattened my neighborhood. But on May 3rd, 1999, I was more worried about my wife than myself. That day, my wife was teaching at Rose State with her first class starting at 5:30. She drove from Norman to Midwest City, blissfully ignorant of what was building up around Chickasha.

I was in Norman watching the reports on TV as it was going through Moore. She called and said she heard the tornado was coming straight for their campus and I told her the building she was in was the strongest, thickest wall poured concrete building in the city and to get in the basement.

As it turned out the path turned slightly and hit part of campus but not her parking lot. When everyone returned to the lot to pick up their cars all the autos looked like chia pets. They were covered with clumps of grass. Our white car had three inches of green growth attached with specs of white showing.

The wind was so fierce it had pulled grass out by its roots.

I was in class that day as a college freshman. The one strange memory of that day was the wind. All day, from morning to afternoon, it was oddly turbulent. It seemed as though the wind couldn't make up its mind on which direction it wanted to blow. Every five or six seconds, a small pocket of slightly cooler air would graze my skin.

And this was at UCO in Edmond, Oklahoma, about twenty miles north of the damage path. I will never forget that feeling.

I remember we were studying for finals that week and watching the storm come in, I thought I would be fine going to Rose State in Midwest City. Wrong. Lucky for me...I happened to be in my Meteorology class! We watched the tv's until it was coming toward us, then we went outside and watched. Of course, the entire school was in the stairwells and basements except my professor, myself, and two other people. We stayed outside until we saw cars flying from the dealership across the street. We ducked down in the stairwell and held the door closed. As soon as it had passed over us, we stepped back outside and watched it roll away. One of the most amazing things I have ever witnessed in my life. Needless to say, he turned to us and said we just passed our finals. That was the best class I've ever had.

Moore - OKCTalk (http://www.okctalk.com/moore/)

I remember we were studying for finals that week and watching the storm come in, I thought I would be fine going to Rose State in Midwest City. Wrong. Lucky for me...I happened to be in my Meteorology class! We watched the tv's until it was coming toward us, then we went outside and watched. Of course, the entire school was in the stairwells and basements except my professor, myself, and two other people. We stayed outside until we saw cars flying from the dealership across the street. We ducked down in the stairwell and held the door closed. As soon as it had passed over us, we stepped back outside and watched it roll away. One of the most amazing things I have ever witnessed in my life. Needless to say, he turned to us and said we just passed our finals. That was the best class I've ever had.
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I have a warehouse in Moore with a Board STILL sticking in the side of it as a reminder.....Ten years is a long time to remember something that vivid. I remember one day there were a bunch of Police at the parking lot when they got a call, they all ran out and sirens blaring....Seems a bulldozer uncovered a storm shelter.....There were 10 ( I think) people in there for days.....when they came out of course they were being asked are you all right and so on..when one of the men said "we're O.K. Help my wife find her Estrogen"....Hmmm a little humor Maybe? or relief never know...will we???

Can anyone tell me if they remember seeing a video on the news from May 3rd 1999 of a lady who had a 2x4 through her head?

I keep thinking it was that day, but I can't find news of it anywhere.

Does anyone else remember this? Does anyone have a link to an article or video, as my fiancee doesn't believe something like that happened.

Can anyone tell me if they remember seeing a video on the news from May 3rd 1999 of a lady who had a 2x4 through her head?

I keep thinking it was that day, but I can't find news of it anywhere.

Does anyone else remember this? Does anyone have a link to an article or video, as my fiancee doesn't believe something like that happened.

I rember seeing her walking into an ER on the news but haven't seen the video of it since then

Needless to say, he turned to us and said we just passed our finals. That was the best class I've ever had.

That was awesome! Congrats on passing your finals! :LolLolLol


Can anyone tell me if they remember seeing a video on the news from May 3rd 1999 of a lady who had a 2x4 through her head?

I keep thinking it was that day, but I can't find news of it anywhere.

Does anyone else remember this? Does anyone have a link to an article or video, as my fiancee doesn't believe something like that happened.

Was it the library lady that I had known? All I heard that she was struck in the head by a flying wood.

I was in 5th grade and I remember we had a little outdoor exploration day. We went and walked around the pond by MHS when it was still a little bit wild. It was a very nice day outside. After school my mom, my younger brother and I had Taco Bueno for dinner because she didn't have time to cook; my brother had a baseball game or practice or something. It was cancelled.

I don't remember watching the news too much, although I know I did. I do remember when my brother and I got into the closet with matresses and our mom on top of us. I wasn't really scared though.

I remember going to sleep listening to the radio (the power had gone out when the tornado passed by). When we woke up, we went to a different 7-Eleven as normal because our usual one was blown down. We bought batteries. I remember just walking around it felt like a different world. Everybody sort of had this "exhausted but glad to be alive" look. I'd lived through the tornados before and a couple after and the aftermath has never felt so apocalyptic as after 5/3/99.

I haven't lived in Moore for about a year, but I'm moving back very soon. What is this I've been hearing about the possibilities of it happening again this year?

I remember getting off early that day. I got home about 4pm right as things were starting to ramp up in sw Ok. While I live on the westside and the Bridgecreek/Moore tornado went well south of us there were other storms in canadian county that threatend the north metro. Luckily they missed the north part of the city. I'd wanted to go chasing that afternoon, but with storms still out west I decided against it. Two things that really stuck out that day were the neverending power bumbs. Each time our power bumbed we knew someone was getting blasted. We felt so helpless for those further south. The other thing I remember was the unusual thunder that day. A friend of mine called it "tall thunder". Meaning thunder coming from cloud to cloud lightning high up in the anvil. It started well before the storm reached the city, and seemed to be non stop. Hopefully I'll never have a story to tell like some of you did from that day.

I haven't lived in Moore for about a year, but I'm moving back very soon. What is this I've been hearing about the possibilities of it happening again this year?

A storm like that happens in an area on average every 3 to 5 years. Now it is 10 years and we're all still waiting for the next *Big Bang*.

We could've had easily gotten a couple of times to be extremely disasterous this year, more specifically during the last month or so, but there was always that one or two things that went wrong/off throwing the whole thing out of balance.

Can anyone tell me if they remember seeing a video on the news from May 3rd 1999 of a lady who had a 2x4 through her head?

I keep thinking it was that day, but I can't find news of it anywhere.

Does anyone else remember this? Does anyone have a link to an article or video, as my fiancee doesn't believe something like that happened.I believe you are refering to a lady who lived on n.w. 15th st. off of Santa Fe in Moore. She lived next door to an OKC Firefighter/Paramedic named Jason Starks. I thought the 2 x 4 impaled her neck not her head. Jason provided EMS and kept her stable until help arrived.

..and Okc surgeon Dr. Chris Carey removed that wood.

All I remember seeing is either the lady being wheeled in on a wheelchair with a piece of board hanging out of her head, or people helping her walk in.

I can't remember... All I remember wondering, is how someone could survive that.

So any videos anyone can find of this lady, or a name, so I can find any articles?

Yes you are correct it was her neck I cannot get that visual out of my head it was unbelievable. We drove around bridgecreek after it went through and seen some amzing things sucha as a horse running in cirlcles because it sucked the horses eyes out and he was blind, the roads it crossed had been stripped clean down to the dirt underneath. People wandering around like it was a dream, with mud covering everything that was still standing. It is one of those days you can never forget, like the bombing downtown.

I watched news reports about the storms in between classes at UCO. By the time I finished my last class, those areas in Moore were destroyed and there was another tornado headed toward my house (where my pregnant wife was). It was a tense drive home. I had to go out of my way to the south to avoid the tornado's path. In addition, my wife wasn't answering the phone and she didn't have a cellphone. I found out when I got home that she and her parents (who were visiting) had gone down the street to a neighbor's shelter. Luckily, only my fence suffered any damage.

We watched it all beginning while eating dinner before the Blazers playoff game that night against the Huntsville Channel Cats. Went to the Myriad naively thinking the metro was a world away from trouble and when we went up the escalator to the arena, they sent us back down into the parking garage, where we waited for probably an hour or so before they called us back up.

The Huntsville hockey team changed their name to the Tornado the next season. Don't know if that's the reason. Had no idea the severity till we got back home from the game about ten o'clock.

I still remember how the air was full of electricity and the way the people in the neighborhood were just walking in a daze. the guys started strapping guns on their hips like it was the old west.....they really were terrified and afraid it would start all over again. I remember all lanes going into Janeway were going the same direction and an Oklahoma Highway Patrolman couldn't stop the traffic even with a drawn weapon. I told him I could stop traffic but it could also create havoc and possibly wrecks...He asked me how and I pointed at a big Box Van truck I owned at the time....He looked at me and said "Please"...Boy, the traffic stopped when the Truck blocked the street...He was so desperate I was afraid he would forget he told me to and give me a ticket....but, everything began to get some sort of order. I laughed at how many people began to "cuss" for no reason other than they were so confused and didn't know what to say at all. Boy. the people of our SMALL OKLAHOMA Town pulled together and won the battle over despair and kept on fighting until the mess was clean.....That's Oklahoma guys but it's really the true Moore Family that held the pieces together.....By the Way, "ToTo this isn't Kansas and you can go HOME.....

I was 19 & in college at the time, but still living with my parents in the neighborhood off 27th in Moore, across from the First Baptist Church. I'd been on the computer (back in the AOL days, hah!) and my sister kept calling from Dallas, telling me I needed to watch the weather, that storms were building down around Lawton. After about the third time she called I started teasing her, told her not to worry I was all prepared for a tornado - that I had my "Dorothy Gale" pigtails & hopefully my Boston Terrier puppy would be a suitable substitute for Toto. I was still sitting in front of the computer when my mom got home with a friend of hers; they had plans to go out to dinner that night & her friend made a joke about "OK, we'll see you guys around 7 so long as this tornado doesn't blow us all away!" Mom came inside & turned on the tv...I could hear Gary England & remember thinking a tornado wouldn't hold together for the distance he was talking about....figured it would be fizzled out by the time it left the Chickasha area.

A few minutes later, our next door neighbor came into the house. Mom had left the door open & I was surprised that he'd just walk in, til he said my dad was outside and told him it was ok to come over & open up the cellar - and then he instructed us to get our stuff together, cause we needed to take cover. We kept watching tv for a bit, flipping from station to station to see who had the best coverage. By the time we all finally got settled down into the cellar, we had quite a crowd. 10 adults, 3 kids, and 3 dogs...of those there was a off-duty Moore police officer & his 8mos pregnant wife, my father the Oklahoma Highway Patrolman, and an associate pastor from The Rock Assembly of God Church.

It felt like we waited forever for the storm to come in. Daddy & one of the others sat up top with the cellar door open, watching what they described as a big wall of blackness move towards us. We had some candles lit, and the radio playing. It still gives me chills when I think about how Gary England sounded...for the first time that I could recall, he sounded panicked. Finally, the wind started to pick up, and it started to rain a little, so my dad came back down into the cellar & closed the door. We sat there listening as Gary begged the people of Moore to get underground. As it got closer, we heard what we thought was hail. When one of the air vent covers was torn off we realized that it wasn't hail that we were hearing, but debris; without the cover on, bits of shingles, wood, and insulation started raining down on top of me where I was sitting in the corner. It was getting louder & louder...at this point, the kids were crying. All I could do was hold on to my mom with one hand & my puppy with the other. I was scared...more scared than I'd ever been. Someone started praying, reciting the Lord's Prayer. We all joined in, even though the sound of the storm & the sirens were drowning us out. I remember thinking it was so loud, it sounded like the house was being destroyed.

Then finally, silence. At first we all just sat there, wondering if it was safe to open the door up. From where I was sitting, when my dad opened the door I could look up & out. I was prepared to see nothing, but to my surprise, the patio cover was still there, and I could see the house. I thought hey, this isn't nearly as bad as I thought! My dad went up first, then the off-duty cop. I heard him say to my dad "I need to get home, I need to get suited up for this." I couldn't understand what he was seeing that I wasn't. To me, everything looked fine. Then it was my turn to go up the steps.

When I looked around the backyard, I was amazed to see....nothing. All the lawn furniture was gone. Trees were uprooted. The fences were down, some missing completely. The swimming pool was black, and the chain link fence around it looked as though someone had wadded it up in their hands. From my vantage point though, it still didn't seem too terribly bad. We went inside, of course the electricity was out. I went out front to check on my car...noticed that my dad had the garage door open & was digging around for something. Then I heard yelling...looked to the South of us...it was an amazing sight. Just this huge mass of people running up the street towards us. At first I couldn't figure out why. Then I looked up the street to the North.

It looked like a warzone. It looked like one huge pile of debris. My dad told me to go inside & tell my mom to come out, and that he was going to go start shutting off gas mains. I went inside, told mom to come out & then took off at a dead run, following my dad. My grandparents lived three houses North of us, I had to make sure they were ok. It seemed to take forever to get there...I kept stepping on nails & they were pushing through the soft soles of my Nikes. I was relieved when I got there to find that they were ok, but being there put me closer to the worst part of it. Standing in their driveway, the air smelled like a strange combination of ozone, natural gas, trash, dirt, and something I still can't place. Maybe devastation just has a scent all to itself.

In the end, we were lucky. Marshal Law started at our house, the National Guard guys set up at the base of our driveway. Every car that was in our driveway had been totalled. We had gaping holes in our roof, the roof of our storage shed was on top of the neighbors house. We lost trees, fences. Had cracked windows, and water damage. But we were safe. We were definitely lucky.

Wow, sorry for such a long post! I could go on, there's lots of stuff I could share that happened that night & the days immediately after, but I'll spare you all another long winded read lol.

A long story is great to share! Thanks, I enjoyed reading it.