>>TORNATO HITS LARAMIE

Yesterday was such a crazy day in Laramie. It all started around 1 or so when a tornado warning siren rang out across the city. For about an hour or so, Sarah (my co-worker) and I sat in the basement at our work. Curtis (who was also hanging out in the basement of his work) would call me every so often and keep Sarah and I updated as to what was going on. When there was finally a break in the storm, Curtis and I hurried home. A lot of Laramie didn't have power, but we were one of the lucky ones who still had power in our house. We just sat and watched the news. Apparently there were 6 or 7 tornadoes between Wyoming and Colorado. Colorado was hit the hardest and suffered a lot of damage.

Later on after the storms settled down, Curtis and I drove around town to see what had happened. Traffic was pretty bad and it was still raining/hailing a bit. I tried to get some pictures, but some of them didn't turn out too well.....























Here are some pictures from the newspaper (The Laramie Boomerang)...

























What a crazy day. I'm thankful that there was no damage to our home and that we were okay. Our poor car did suffer some hail damage, but if that is the worst thing to happen, I'm okay with that.

Here is the article from the Laramie Boomerang about the tornado....

A fast moving storm resulted in several tornado warnings early Thursday afternoon. The warnings continued for almost three hours, forcing people to wait out the storm in basements of homes and office buildings or huddle in hallways at the schools.The warnings followed almost 20 hours of rain and drizzle. The storm intensified around 1 p.m., bringing heavy rains, high winds, golf-ball sized hail and later, snow.The storm hit east Laramie the hardest.Trash — plywood, cardboard boxes, trash bags and paper — was strewn along the right-of-way and fence from the Grand Avenue exit to Wal-Mart. The sagebrush field that lies in between the Animal Health Center and AmericInn was filled with trash and an upended flatbed trailer.Laramie resident Connie Petrie, who lives with her husband Jim at 4804 Evergreen, said parts of their home’s roof were taken off in the storm. Her fence was torn apart and her patio furniture blew away, she said.“We don’t have a basement, but I went into the bathroom that is in the middle of our house at around 1:35 p.m.,” she said. “My husband watched.”Petrie described strong winds, a lot of hail and then, all of the sudden, “a slam and a loud noise.”“The roof went off and the fences all came down,” Petrie said. “A 40-foot spruce tree came down and our patio furniture is somewhere. We don’t know where.”Petrie said she and her husband have lived in the same home for six years.“We’ve never seen weather like this,” Petrie said. “Not in Wyoming … we did in Tulsa, Oklahoma.”Petrie said that she had heard the storm was moving north on Wyoming Highway 287 mid-afternoon.“The funny thing is … we were watching south. And just that fast, it hit,” Petrie said. “But it hit out of the northeast.”In her neighborhood, Petrie described downed power lines and destroyed fences, roofs and corrals. Many buildings in Laramie’s newest Grandview Heights subdivision suffered damage as well, she said.“They had two houses that had the framing up (Thursday) morning and they are gone,” Petrie said.Petrie also described a chaotic scene on Interstate 80.“A Lowe’s truck had been blown over … there was a semi that had some boats on the back and they are all over the freeway,” Petrie said. “The cars are all turned higgly-piggly all over the road. It is weird.”The Imperial Heights subdivision suffered the most damage in the area. Laramie Police officers restricted access to the subdivision to residents, citing property damage. Rocky Mountain Power trucks were on the scene to assess the damage done to the subdivision’s power lines.The Tumbleweed Gas Station sustained severe damage. The high winds ripped off the building’s roof, revealing the skeletal four-by-four boards underneath. Several sheriff’s deputies were picking up four-by-four boards from the street that had blown from the Tumbleweed.The hail that pummeled Laramie at about 1:30 p.m. remained on the ground at 2:30 p.m., looking like snow in the grass.High winds tipped over a semi tractor-trailer on Interstate 80 near the Grand Avenue exit. The Wyoming Highway Patrol, Albany County Sheriff’s Office, Laramie Police Department and Laramie Fire Department responded to the crash.Mary Jo Atherton, who lives at 2824 Sage Drive just south of Wal-Mart, said the roof of her barn was taken off in the storm.“The storm blew the roof off the barn, but we think we are safe,” Atherton said minutes after the first storm wave moved through Laramie. “We’ve got a basement.”Around 1:25 p.m., Atherton said she and her family ducked into their basement for cover.“We lost some trees, and after a quick look of the roof on the house, I haven’t seen any damage,” Atherton said.“We grew up in tornados, so we knew what signs to look for,” she said, around 2:20 p.m. Thursday. “It was just the high winds, hail … and we heard there is another storm coming, so we are going back into the basement.”At 1055 Inca, Donald Shoefelt assessed the damage to his house during a lull in the rain and hail, while his grandson, Kevin, took photographs.A tree had fallen across a fence and into the side of the house, and parts of the fence in the backyard were damaged.“I had my wife get back away from the window because I was afraid it was going to explode. It was terribly loud,” he said. “I didn’t know that tree blew over until we started looking out the window when it kind of calmed down.”Near his house, extreme winds ripped off part of the roof and the entire porch of the Quadra Dangle Square Dance Club, an 80-year-old log building on the National Register of Historic Places. Club members were busy mopping up water and laying tarps over the exposed dance floor Thursday evening.“We heard a tremendous roar and a lot of banging up here,” said club president William Wright, one of five people who were in the basement when the storm hit.Several trees on Jacoby Golf Course were broken or torn up.Along Harney, Bresnan engineer Doc Thissen pulled over to inspect a downed power line. He said a long section of power lines running along the ride north of Indian Paintbrush Elementary School and west of 30th were blown over.“It’s all laying on the ground,” he said.Command CenterWhen the first tornado warning was issued, employees at City Hall followed evacuation protocol and headed to the basement where the command center was being set up.City Manager Janine Jordan said once the first tornado warning had expired, she sent all non-essential personnel home.Jordan, Public Works Director Richard Elliott, Administrative Service Director Malea Brown, Mayor Klaus Hanson, Fire Chief Randy Vickers, Police Chief Bob Deutsch and Albany County Sheriff Jim Pond set up the command center in the jury room in the basement.Jordan said they were coordinating information as it came in.“We’re taking information on public hazards and damaged infrastructure. We’re really a clearing house for information,” she said. The damage appeared to be most extensive in the northeast side of the city with reports of damaged buildings and reports of downed trees causing road blockages.Mayor Hanson said that there was flooding reported along 30th and Reynolds.Sheriff Jim Pond, watching the weather radar on a laptop with Chief Deutsch, said those in the command center work on coordinating resources to address the issues that are reported. Those resources on Thursday included the Wyoming Army National Guard.Hanson said they were also communicating with the Wyoming Department of Transportation regarding road closures. According to WYDOT Interstate 80 westbound between Cheyenne and Laramie, U.S. Highway 30 north of Laramie and U.S. Highway 287 south of Laramie closed at about 3:20 p.m. due to the severe weather and tornado warnings and watches posted for the area. The roads were opened just before 5 p.m.At 4 p.m., Pond and Deutsch were tracking a storm that was directly over Cheyenne. Deutsch said the redder the radar, the worse the storm, with Cheyenne a deep red at the time. Pond said the storm appeared to be dissipating as it moved toward Laramie.They were prepared to continue to monitor the storm until the thunderstorm had completely passed.Pond said they would be doing some further damage assessment soon. “Right now we are working on power and keeping the streets open,” he said. Deutsch said deputies and police officers were patrolling the streets and making reports of damage they saw.Deutsch added that most of the work will fall to Elliott and the Public Works Department and the Parks and Recreation Department, depending on where the damage is and where clean-up is needed.CountyAlbany County Courthouse employees were given notice at 1:30 p.m. that there was a tornado warning for Laramie, and employees were advised to go home or head to the basement. District Court Clerk Janice Sexton, waiting for the third tornado warning to expire, said: “I don’t want to go home alone so I’m in the basement. I don’t have a problem staying all night.”She said early in the afternoon there were probably 50 or more people in the basement. Some, like Sexton, crowded by the stairs in front of the Sheriff’s Office and County Attorney’s Office.“Everyone’s on their cell phones trying to check on friends and family,” Sexton said. She said at one point, a couple who live in an apartment building, came to the courthouse basement seeking shelter.Albany County Clerk Jackie Gonzales said her staff, along with other county employees, was gathered in the commissioner’s meeting room getting updates on the tornado warnings via the Internet displayed on a big screen. They were looking at the Web cameras from the Wyoming Department of Transportation. Two of her staff members, Karen Spears and Josie Montez, were at Laramie High School for voter registration when the school locked down about 1:30 p.m.Spears said: “It’s the only voter registration I thought would last all night. They kept extending the warning — 1:45, 2 p.m., 2:15 p.m.”Spears and Montez were able to register several people in the first 90 minutes before the lockdown. They gathered with school employees, where Spears said her fortune, from a fortune cookie Montez had, said: “You have found good company. Enjoy.” They were allowed to leave at about 3:30 p.m., along with students whose parents picked them up.