Tornado Run

The first post of 2008, imagine that. The weather was nice yesterday so I went for a ride to look at all the devastation caused by the tornado that took a Northeastern run across Arkansas. The area I looked at was South and West of Atkins. The damage was considerable to say the least. Alot of the houses that were destroyed have now been piled up so the oringinal look I didnt get to see but still what is left was bad.

The Union Grove Church is still there, kind of, it hasnt been totally cleaned yet. You can look Northeast and Southwest and see the swath that tornado took to get there. It looks as if the trees had their tops cut off with a huge weedeater and other were just twisted and split in odd shapes. Tin was wrapped around trees, fences and other buildings like it was so much thin aluminum foil. Huge trees were uprooted and others looked like a giants foot had stepped on them as it was traveled Northeast.

Its really strange how the houses within feet of the swath of destruction recieved little or no damage, if they were not in the path of the giant weedeater they were safe. I saw the Red Cross, the Salvation Army and hundreds of volunteers helping with the cleanup.

The Union Grove Church goers were lucky in a strange way. Next door, within maybe 50 ft of the Church was the church nursery, which was being used at the time. I heard there were guite a few children in the nursery when the tornado struck. The Nursery though was undamaged.

As far as Motorcycles go, there were alot out yesterday, several groups were touring the area and alot of singles, myself being one.



This is a pic from the East side of Crow Mtn. If you zoom in, you can see Lucky Landing in the distance where the smoke is.

Looking East at I-40. Zooom in and you can see the front of the Union Grove Church to the left of the Interstate.

This is a closer look at the front.

This is where I crossed I-40, the South and East side of the Church. In the forground you can see the Nursery where several children were during the storm. It was untouched.

This is the North side of the Church.



This is a picture near the Feed Mill on Hwy 64. The tornado crossed the Hwy just East of the Mill. The direction the camera is looking is the direction the tornado came from.