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May 20, 2014 May 20, 2014 May 20, 2014 May 20, 2014
The May 20, 2013, Newcastle/OKC/Moore tornado: My Experience
I've lived through some of the most extreme weather in Oklahoma history ... most
of it by happenstance. Every Oklahoman, be you a native like myself or a
transplant, will eventually experience some of the worst the state's climate has
to offer. That's part of the Okie experience. Bad things occur and then the
state comes together and stands behind you. I'd like to think that is true for
much of this great country of ours. As the odds work out, however, most of us
end up being bystanders, spectators or volunteers, glued to the television
witnessing the calamitous misfortune of others and wondering "what can I do?"
And while I hope it never happens to you, someday, you might actually find
yourself playing the role of one of those in need. Only then can you truly
appreciate how much it means to give aid to those that need it.
My son Jackson went to a daycare during the 2013 school year for kindergarten
instead of public school since we failed to win the lottery for a place in one
of Moore Schools' all-day kindergarten classes. It was just easier that way. My
twin daughters Jenna and Jessica were in second grade at Moore's Oakridge
Elementary on SW 164th and Santa Fe. Each morning I would drive through the
Stone Meadows neighborhood and exit east onto 149th, drive past Briarwood to SW
19th and Santa Fe and head north to his daycare at SW 11th (SW 149th turns into
SW 19th on the east side of Santa Fe, the division between OKC and Moore). I
would then drive south and drop my girls off at Oakridge and make the drive to
the NWC in Norman. My wife, an assistant principal at Southgate Elementary up
on NW 5th Street west of Janeway Ave. in Moore, would usually leave a bit
earlier than me. Most of our everyday lives revolved around this area in
SW OKC and Moore, taking kids to school, going to those playgrounds, stopping
at the 7-11 on SW 19th and Santa Fe for slushies, shopping at the Wal Mart on
SW 19th and I35, going to movies at the Warren, etc. THIS WAS/IS MY
NEIGHBORHOOD!
I left work early on May 20th of last year, concerned for my kids with the
distinct possibility of severe weather repeating itself from the previous day's
tornado outbreak which killed two people and injured 14 others. I remember it
was a Monday because Sunday's tragic events played on our TV throughout the day
after Church. When I pick up my kids from school, the teachers ears would
perk up. Not that I am some great forecaster, although they might think I am.
Just because they know I am "a weatherman." Truth be told, I just happen to
work across the hall in the NWC from some of the most experienced and
accomplished severe weather experts in the world at the Norman National Weather
Service office, the Storm Prediction Center, and the National Severe Storms
Lab. I was antsy from the beginning of that morning, but it was this
particular graphical product from Norman's NWS office that sent me home at noon,
poised in position to make the drive through the neighborhood to get my kids.
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20130523/IMG_1702.PNG
When the first echoes on the radar started showing up around 2pm, that's all
the prompting I needed to make the drive first to Jackson's daycare, then to
get my girls at Oakridge, then letting my wife know that the storms were
beginning to fire out west of Moore near Blanchard and Tuttle. The first severe
thunderstorm warning was issued for that storm at 2:12pm. At that time, the
kids and I were just making it home and turned on the TV. I was switching
channels wildly between each of the news stations, all the while watching for
NWS alerts on Facebook and Twitter. You can actually read what Norman NWS was
sending out on social media that day right here.
http://www.srh.noaa.gov/oun/?n=events-20130520-chronology
It seemed in no time at all, the first tornado warning was issued and the sirens
starting going off in Moore. This wasn't our first rodeo, of course. I took the
kids to the cellar and called my wife and told her to get her school under
cover, there was a possible tornado on the way. I took my iPad into the cellar
with me and watched whatever online TV coverage I could via my wifi connection.
We watched the tornado develop in Newcastle just like the rest of you. From
that point on, time seemed to speed up. The next thing we knew, all the TV
meteorologists were saying anybody between SW 164th and SW 134th from May Ave.
to Western Ave. were in the path of this violent tornado. Heck, the thing was
just a rope a few minutes ago! We *felt* the tornado more than we heard it at
first as it approached the intersection of SW 149th and Western about a half-
mile to our north. The bottles of water we had taken down into the storm shelter
with us started to ripple as they sat on the benches next to us. Then
the vibrations increased as did the sound as the gigantic twister churned
through our neighborhood to the north. At that point I sent a text to my wife
to take shelter where she was up at NW 5th Street and just west of Janeway
Ave. She was in the probable path as well. I found out later she never did
take shelter, risking herself to make sure the kids were being sheltered but
also helping those parents who were showing up at the neighborhood school to
get their kids. Much too late at that point, of course. I started sending out
Facebook posts, pleading for help if our house was destroyed. The thought of
being buried under our house in the shelter was not a joyous one. It was
already sweltering in our underground haven.
"Gary McManus
May 20, 2013 near Oklahoma City, OK
SW 158th st, we are in the cellar, search for us in case"
The power went out as the house creaked and moaned, a cacophony of sounds
generated by one of the most violent tornadoes in recorded history. Our wifi
was now useless. Time was no longer moving quickly. One of my daughters was
crying loudly, I'm not sure which one. My son stared at a flashlight he held as
if concentrating on that light would make it all go away. The garage door was
being pelted with debris through the ordeal, which we mistook for our house
being lifted away. I'm not sure how one would tell the difference. Slowly, the
roaring stopped and in the suffocating air, I decided to open the shelter,
terrified of what I would find. To my surprise, our house seemed okay as we
emerged into the dark garage and lifted the powerless garage door. What I saw
shocked and amazed me ... a sky full of debris, falling all around me.
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20130523/IMG_1689.MOV
The tornado was to our northeast plowing its way towards the Moore Warren,
the hospital and then to the east of I35. I quickly helped my kids out of the
sweltering shelter and turned on the only thing we had functioning to get
any news, the car radio. One of the TV stations was simulcasting and it said
it appeared two Moore elementary schools had been hit by the tornado. Briarwood
was an obvious guess. To be honest, I didn't know exactly where Plaza Towers
was since it is a neighborhood school off the beaten path, much like my wife's
school up on NW 5th Street. I tried texting my wife but got no signal, of
course. My neighbor came over with her kids and then the entire neighborhood
was out taking stock, making sure each other was okay. But I had to know if
my wife was okay. Driving was obviously going to be out of the question. Then
my neighbor made a crazy suggestion ... "take my bike." Now I hadn't ridden a
bike in about 15 years it seemed like, but desperate times will drive you to
desperate acts. Thinking that Southgate Elementary had been hit, I set off on
the bike, prepared to make the 4 mile trip to her school.
It became horrifyingly obvious as I went but 3-4 streets north of our house
on SW 158th that things were not going to be okay if I continued to head north
along Vicki Drive towards SW 149th and Briarwood Elementary. I came upon a
staging area for Briarwood kids and their parents just south of 149th on Vicki
Drive a war zone triage area where there shouldn't be one. Making it onto 149th
street, I was taken by the smell, the smell of freshly cut green wood and of
dirt. Natural gas bellowed loudly from broken mains. This is the view I saw
when I looked towards Briarwood Elementary a ways east on SW 149th Street.
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20140520/IMG_1692.JPG
That is the correct picture. There was simply no Briarwood left.
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20140520/IMG_1693.JPG
I drove past things I had not hoped to see ... small kids, just like my own,
bloodied by debris. Faces with dirt and pebbles embedded in the skin, ambulances
beginning to be filled with unknown casualties. I was driving over power lines,
filled with confidence that was safe since others were walking over them. The
one oddity I noticed was the the people smoking, even though the hiss of gas
made it hard to hear at times. Somewhere, a very large main was leaking.
I made it through ambulances and the injured, kids howling and parents making
tearful reunions, to the corner of SW 19th and Santa Fe. This is where I would
have to turn north to get to my wife's school some three miles to the north.
My son's daycare, where he would have ridden out the storm had I not picked
him up, was down that street about a mile or so. One look told me I was
probably going to have to go on foot. This was the Dollar General store on the
NE corner of SW 19th and Santa Fe.
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20130523/IMG_1696.JPG
This is what the view to the south looked like, towards Oakride and also
Southmoore High School.
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20130523/IMG_1697.JPG
At that point, I received a text from a relative saying that they had gotten
through to my wife and she was okay. She was leaving Southgate and going to go
west and then south to try and get close to home. Relieved, I had to get back
to my kids. Back through the debris, the injured kids and the terrified parents,
on my first bicycle ride in more than a decade.
When I got back to my house, into the relatively unscathed area of SW 158th and
Western, I realized we were extremely lucky. Oh, we had some roof damage (later
totaled) and lost our fence. But we were not facing the loss and destruction
that those just a few streets north were dealing with.
The next week was surreal. My wife did not make it home that night. She stayed
with friends up on SW 119th and Penn, unable to make it past the tornadoes path
to the south. She had to drive north to I240, east to Eastern, west to Santa
Fe on Indian Hills Road before traffic came to a standstill. Desperate to make
it home to see her family, she parked in a driveway and ran the few miles home
in a sudden rainstorm.
We had no power for five more days. I believe it finally came back on Friday
night. The night of the 20th was eerie with the only noise (and lights) coming
from helicopters hovering over the damage areas just to our north. For the
next four days, the families of the neighborhood spent all their time
outdoors during the day until darkness approached, then back into their houses
to the protection of their houses at night.
We were advised to not leave the neighborhood those first few days because
there was a possibility we would not be back in ... a protective measure against
looters. Each entrance to the neighborhood was blocked by police from across
the state sent to help.
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20130523/IMG_1709.JPG
Our first day out was easy, but it took hours to get back into the neighborhood
thanks to a stream of cars that stretched for miles, many of which I suspect
were rubber-necking, hoping to glimpse the damage of calamity of our neighbors'
lives. We had to show IDs to get back into the neighborhood.
So no, we didn't lose any material goods, other than a few hundred dollars worth
of groceries from a refrigerator and freezer. Our roof and fence (and smaller
superficially damaged things about the exterior of the house) were covered by
insurance.
What we did lose was the innocence of the spectator. No longer were we the ones
watching the storm's aftermath and the spectacle of shattered lives from the
comfort of our living room. We were living it. Each storm brings a renewed
sense of terror to my kids, always prompting me if we are going to have
tornadoes. The best I can say is no. Odds favor I'll be right.
Had I not gotten my kids that day, all of them would have been safe anyway.
Even my son Jack, whose daycare was directly in the damage path. His daycare had
a great shelter, although the building he took classes in was demolished. As
you can see from this map, however, the worst damage was definitely too close
for comfort.
http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20140520/map.png
And I do have comfort; the comfort of knowing that my family was safe. Twenty-
four other people will never know that comfort following that day, nor will
their families, forever scarred by the capricious nature of Oklahoma's weather
and the peculiar physics, most of which we don't understand, of why a tornado
forms in one particular area and moves to another particular area before
dissipating. And yet, those that do their best to keep us safe, from the
forecasters at the NWS and SPC to the storm spotters out risking life and limb
in harm's way being operated by the Moore and OKC Emergency Managers ... they
will always be heroes in my book.
Again, this is just one very lucky family's story. Our neighborhood was destroyed
but it has been largely rebuilt. The pain the community has suffered will never
be forgotten, just as the echoes of May 3, 1999, October 4, 1998, and May 9,
2003, linger with each storm that comes close. Now those storms will have the
company of May 20, 2013.
To read a much more complete and precise timeline and analysis of events, go
to this page put together from the Norman NWS office. And always remember, your
transformation from spectator to participant might be one storm away.
http://www.srh.noaa.gov/oun/?n=events-20130520
Gary McManus
State Climatologist
Oklahoma Mesonet
Oklahoma Climatological Survey
(405) 325-2253
gmcmanus@mesonet.org
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