News from November 10, 2005 issue

Tornado destroys 3 homes here
In a matter of seconds, the force of Sunday morning's F2 tornado awoke John Rich and Annie Girten from a restful sleep and threw them onto the ground from their second story bedroom. Simultaneously, the house was ripped to pieces and scattered several hundred yards down the hill and across Ky. 365.

"I woke up and Annie was calling my name and it sounded like the vinyl was ripping off and debris was coming against the house," Rich said. "We got out of bed and I took two steps and the house collapsed. It was like it put me in a box, shook me up and threw me out."

Neither John nor his father Bob Rich, who was sleeping in a first-floor bedroom, was seriously injured but were battered and bruised by debris flying in the 130-mph twister. Girten, who landed near her car on the ground behind where the house once stood, remains in progressive care at Deaconess Hospital in Evansville. She is being treated for a head wound. She told John Rich she surveyed the damage to their home from the LifeFlight helicopter en route to Deaconess Sunday morning.

In the few seconds it took for the tornado to throw John Rich onto the front yard, he says he remembers thinking he was going to die.

What he heard next was Girten yelling for him. When he found her, she was bleeding severely from her head. He looked around in the pitch black and saw one of his trucks with flat tires and the windshield and windows blown out. Jumping into the cab filled with glass, he took Girten to their neighbors' home, Darren and Tonya Courtney.

"We were covered with blood, and pulled up in the driveway honking," he said, and waited until an amubulance arrived.

The surprising thing to John Rich was that they were still alive.

Mere seconds before the tornado obliterated Rich's two-story Amish built house, two structures on Ky. 654 were victimized by the same twister.

Charlotte Phelps was making her way back to bed after getting a drink of water when the roof started falling.

"I squatted and things started falling and Roger had windows on the bed with him, and the dresser fell over against the bed but neither one of us had a scratch on us," Phelps said.
Her daughter Lisa Mayes, son-in-law Allen and two grandchildren were in their mobile home at the back of the property. It was literally torn to pieces.

Her grandson Kory, 12, spent one night at Crittenden Hospital where doctors and nurses removed a large piece of glass from his thigh.

Both the Riches' and Phelps' homes have basements, but since the storm hit in the middle of the night, neither family had any warning to seek shelter. Perhaps a testament to the safety of basements ­ all of the contents of both of the families' basements were unscathed by the storm.
The tornado's path started near the Phelps' house and traveled easterward to the Rich home. It also damaged three other houses, those of Dwight Ricketson, Tommy Ricketson and Jim Blackburn.

Blackburn, 74, lives on Chandler Farm Road.

"The hail woke me up," he said. "It sounded like ball bats hitting the house. It felt like the house moved but I went back to sleep.

"At 3 a.m., someone was knocking at the door. There wasn't any electricity and two firefighters had a flashlight. I thought, 'What in the world are you doing here?' and they told me I'd lived through a tornado."

Officials say the twister never touched down but went over Blackburn's house. It still did considerable damage to his roof and garage and took down a number of trees on the driveway leading to his house. It also broke a birdbath and other ornamental pieces in a memorial garden he was constructing in memory of his late wife.

"That Fellow upstairs was looking over me," Blackburn said.

County Judge-Executive Fred Brown said Chandler Farm Road was impassable when he and other officials made their way through that section of the county in the wee hours of Sunday morning.

Members of the Crittenden County Rescue Squad, Mattoon Fire Department, county road department and other volunteers converged on the area to look for victims, survey the damage within minutes of the storm's passing. By daybreak Sunday everyone had been accounted for, and neighbors wasted no time helping sift through the wreckage.

An estimated 75 people worked at the Phelps' home on Ky. 654 Sunday, moving out furniture and recovering belonings that had been scattered into a wooded area behind their home.
Amish neighbors fixed a meal for those still on the property around 5 p.m., Sunday, and the Red Cross made several trips to their home to drop off water and donations of breakfast and lunch from a Marion restaurant.

It was much the same at the Rich home, where John Rich estimates 150 people helped search through debris finding his guns, jewelry under Girten's car, a jon boat 300 yards away and a life jacket at Jim Blackburn's about a three-quarters a mile through the woods.

"The strangest thing for me was I put a loaf of bread and some chips on top of the refrigerator when I got home last night, and it was still there after the storm," Charlotte Pheps said.


Guardsmen will deploy on Nov. 27
City will host send-off ceremony
The Marion Kentucky National Guard unit will be deploying Nov. 27 for active duty.
There will be the traditional march of soldiers from the armory to the courthouse and a send-off ceremony. The march will begin at about 9:30 a.m., Sunday, Nov. 27 and the ceremony will start at 10 a.m.

Staff Sgt. Sarah Holler of the National Guard said the ceremony will last about one hour.

"We've been terrified that this is going to conflict with regular church services so we're going to try to keep the ceremony to just under an hour so people can come and still get to church," Holler said. "I think most of the churches start at 11 a.m., with their Sunday service."

Holler said the march from the armory to the courthouse is quite impressive and encourages residents to come and take part by lining the streets. The march will begin at the armory on Rochester Street, proceed down Cherry Street then westwardly on Bellville Street to the courthouse. The street behind the courthouse will be blocked off where there will be stadium bleachers for guests and risers for the speakers. Seating will be limited and spectators may want to bring a lawn chair.

"After the ceremony, the soldiers will have a few minutes to visit with their families then board buses to go to Camp Shelby, Miss.," Holler said.

Marion Main Street director Rose Crider is encouraging local businesses to decorate for the sendoff weekend by painting patriotic symbols on their windows or putting messages on their marquees. The local unit is known as Bravo Company and messages may want to identify it that way, Holler said.

The ceremony will include local and state dignitaries including governmental and military leaders.

More than 40 soldiers will be deploying in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. The unit will be at Camp Shelby for about three months before getting its orders, which will likely take the men overseas.

About a dozen of the men deploying are from Crittenden County or the immediate area. Others are from throughout the region.

Holler said residents can continue to show their support for the troops while they are gone by helping the families left behind.

"To be honest, the families have a tougher time with this than the soldiers," Holler said. "It can be an exhaustive situation for a mother who isn't accustomed to handling all of the family business and children alone while her husband is deployed."

Often, families are too proud to ask for help while their loved ones are deployed, Holler said. She encourages neighbors and others to show their support for military families by helping mow yards, babysitting, providing meals and handling other chores.