Crestwood Kids Raising Funds for Fire Capt. Who Lost House, Fighting Cancer

A captain in the Crestwood Department of Fire Services, Keith Bell was home fighting cancer, when he lost his house in Bridgeton to the Good Friday tornado. He and his wife Tammy huddled in the basement when the house was destroyed.

Bell was on leave from work to cope with chemo treatments, according to a top official. Otherwise, he may have been at work, in Crestwood.

The only item left standing in their front yard, according to a Crestwood Elementary's PTO email, was a statue of a firefighter.

Since every year on September 11, Crestwood's students pay tribute to local firefighters and police officers, students are now raising funds for Bell through Monday, May 9. Checks should be made to Crestwood Elementary School.

The Bell couple have lived 12 years in Harmann Estates—an area that appeared to take the brunt of an EF4 twister April 22 about 8 p.m.

Bell, a 28-year veteran of Crestwood fire, said his wife went into the basement when they heard warnings on TV Friday that the storm was headed their way from New Melle. She was on the basement floor under a blanket, he said.

Bell said he stood at the top of the steps to the basement, looking at the weather. 

"It started getting really bad. And I slammed the door. And as I'm walking across the basement, my ears pop and I started hearing crashing, and I knew that we had major damage. I didn't know it was this bad," Bell said, gesturing toward the pile of rubble that was his house.

He said he knelt down on the basement floor next to his wife until it seemed over—15 or 20 seconds. The crashing and other noise stopped.

"I went up the steps and looked out, and just couldn't believe the house was just gone," Bell said. "You don't even know how to describe the feeling."

He said they have about an acre of property, and that all the trees in the back yard had no tops on them. 

"It's just unbelievable. It's unbelievable we made it through this," Bell said. "But we're going to make it." He said they would likely rebuild.

Friends and members of the Crestwood fire department showed up early Sunday at Bell's property and set up plastic tarp shelters to protect from the rain items belonging to Bell that they collected from among the debris

KSDK reporter Jeff Small posted online Sunday a video of Bell talking about the moments when his house was destroyed. Patch used this to reconstruct the events here.