Our Tornado Close Call

A CLOSE CALL, THESE 3 TORNADO’S FROM LAST WEDNESDAY’S STORMS, ALL STOPPED JUST MILES FROM OUT HOUSE, WHICH SITS JUST A HALF INCH DOWN FROM THE WORD WORCESTER, ON THE RIGHT OF THIS MAP.

Last week, while driving home from work, I could see that the sky was very dark, green even. Never a good thing during thunderstorm season here in New England. Suddenly, just as a reporter from NPR our local Boston station was reporting on the recovery in Joplin, Missouri, the report was interrupted by the infamous EEEEEp-EEEEEEp-EEEEEEEEP of the National Emergency Broadcast system. Usually it was followed by “this is a test, of the National Emergency Broadcast System, if this was an actual emergency…” but sadly, it was. A tornado was sighted, in fact two were sighted near our home in Massachusetts, and I was driving straight into the storm from the south, since I work an hour away in Providence, Rhode Island.

MY DAD, VITTY A. MATTUS ,AN AMERICAN  REGIONALIST ARTIST WHO PAINTED REGIONALIST WORKS FROM THE 1930’s UNTIL THE MID 1950’S. THIS IS HIS INTERPRETATION OF THE GREAT WORCESTER TORNADO. Oil on Canvas.

You may think that tornado’s are rare in New England, but they are not. In fact, in until last month’s Joplin tragedy, our June 9, 1953 Worcester Tornado, with winds estimated at 256 MPH was an EF5, the country’s deadliest tornado destroyed my home town of Worcester, injuring 1288 people and killing 94. I  was raised with this unrealistic ( or realistic?) tornado fear, since I was born ten years after the big tornado, and even though it hit the northern part of our city, every time we drove through it, my dad would show us how all of the trees were gone, and vivid details of the that fateful day.

A RARE PHOTO OF THE 1953 WORCESTER, MASSACHUSETTS TORNADO, AN EF5

Ironically, this past Wednesday’s storm, he spent on a lounge chair outside by accident. At 97, he still gets around, but he is obsessed with feeding the birds. He is also, dare I say, or Hell, I’ll just say it….a nudist. Yep. He liked to lay in the sun nude. He thinks this is one reason why he lives so long,, but that’s for another post. Wednesday, he fell asleep in the lounge chair by the greenhouse and then couldn’t get up because it was too low. Joe was taking a nap testing our the new air conditioner he had bought earlier that day, in the guest bedroom with Margaret and the other dogs, and never heard the storm coming. Needless to day, after surviving hail, lightning and heavy wind and rain, dad’s none for the worse and has a cool story to tell his girlfriend.

THE ENTIRE NORTHERN PART OF OUR CITY WAS DESTROYED, SIMILAR TO THE JOPLIN TORNADO.

Thankfully, the storm passed over us just after the tornado lifted and weakened. The storms were trailing, and there were four tornado warnings, and on the weather channel, we could see the storms as they kept forming over and over again over the same towns, and then head straight for us. The meteorologists kept saying “if your in this path, in Worcester or Auburn, you had better take shelter immediately, since these storms are moving fast. In then end, we are all fine, but the towns just to the west of us have significant damage, and 4 fatalities. One tornado that just missed us, was rated an EF3, and it traveled 39 miles before it lifted just 5 miles from our house.