Community Corner

Sunset Hills New Year's Eve Tornado—A Year Later

In the second installment of the series, Patch spoke with Ann, who was in the middle of the storm on Court Drive.

Last New Year’s Eve, Ann was at home by herself. A recently divorced mother of two teenagers who were at their dads, Ann was going to stay home for the first time ever and rent movies for the night. As she was sitting in her kitchen planning out what she wanted to renovate on her home for the next year, she heard tornado sirens.

“I literally had the business cards to a tree person, a plumber, etc. on my breakfast bar,” Ann said. “I was emailing friends and wishing everyone a happy new year. I told a friend in Michigan that it was quite warm here for this time of year.” 

Ann said that if her kids would have been home, she would have taken them downstairs. But, it was noon on New Year’s Eve. Who thinks there is going to be a tornado?

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“I then noticed it was raining, but then it started raining in a circular direction,” she said. “I was in socks, yoga pants and a T-shirt.”

Ann immediately went downstairs and called her mom, and then the lights went out.

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“I hears slapping noises against the house and I said, ‘I think it’s getting bad here,’” she said. “I could feel the suction while I was on the phone with her. It literally sucked the air out of you. I was like ‘Oh my God it must be right overhead.’ You never think it’s actually going to happen to you.”

After sitting in the dark with nothing but her cell phone, Ann heard banging on her front door. She and her neighbors smelled gas. The gas meter was severed, and neighbors were pounding on the door to get her out of the house.

“When I opened my front door, it was like opening my front door to a war zone,” she said. “I immediately went into shock. I couldn’t wrap my head around it. Cars were flipped; trees were down; houses were gone.”

Gas was spewing out of the severed line, so neighbors got Ann shoes and a jacket, and the group gathered with others down the street.

“I was shaking. I called my mom back and I said that my house was gone. It was just insane. So much for my quiet evening at home,” she said. 

The tree that Ann was planning on having removed in the new year had fallen on her house, taking out half of it. 

“The one thing I tell everyone is to watch what you wish for. I wanted things fixed and the tree down, but this is not how I wanted to do it,” Ann said. “It took me almost 36 hours just to stop shaking.”

Ann and her kids spent two weeks at her mom’s home and then spent the end of January to August in an apartment.

Now what used to be the fourth house on the right of Court Drive is a rebuilt third house. It was torn down and rebuilt almost exactly the way it was before.

“My goal from day one was to get the house rebuilt so we could get back home. To be uprooted like that was just horrible,” Ann said. “We didn’t really change much to the house. The more changes I made the longer it would take.”

Ann said that it was weird moving back in to a similar house than the one before, albeit a new one. 

“Sometimes it feels so homey and like it never happened. I know now how Dorothy felt. Over my TV set I have ‘There’s no place like home’ written,” she said.

This Christmas Ann’s family donated to Service International, who she said was so prominent in coming down the street and helping everyone. She remembers neighbors who came over with hot cocoa and hand warmers because it got cold, churches donating mattresses.

“It was an eye-opener for me and I learned a lot in so many ways. Don’t take life for granted,” she said.

This New Year’s Eve, Ann’s neighbors are having a pajama party, but she still wouldn’t mind trying again to stay home and having some friends over to watch a movie. 

“I can’t imagine lightning striking twice, but you never know,” she said.  “People are making jokes again this year about the warm weather, but I don’t think it’s funny. “


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