Our neighborhood was hit by a tornado 9 years ago this summer. 30 homes were flattened, 100 damaged. We were lucky and only ended up with a random trampoline in our yard, and our swingset demolished. The neighbors directly across the street had one of their bedrooms completely destroyed, while the homes about 6 houses down the street were destroyed completely. The only death was one pet dog,and only one woman was seriously injured. Still it was devastating to our community and to the children especially,who were home at the time (we were not). My heart goes out to the people of Oklahoma.

We do not have "pipped in" television in our home. But I go and visit my dad (a widower) every evening for a while to check in and keep him company. I usually watch the weather channel with him for a few moments. I was aghast at the destruction of this tornado in Oklahoma. I pray for those who lost loved ones and homes. I have lost a child so feel so badly for the families that lost children as well. I have been praying for God to be with all those that have a long road of clean up and rebuilding their homes and lives. Those whose lives will be changed forever. My family and animals on our farm have a huge respect and (my children are now very afraid of storms) because we live in North Georgia where we have had many tornado's in our area over the years. The closest ones that went right by our home were the one huge tornado that went thru a few months back. The path was less than a mile from our home and we lost a huge tree. All around our home and down the street from us was just devastated. The path was all the way from Adairsville to Oakman. It was powerful and on the ground for a long period of time. The path of that thing was just piles of rubble once it was gone. Praise God our community lost only one soul. Bless his heart. It would have been much worse but happened while everyone was at work as well. So most of the homes were empty. About a year before this one came thru another had went thru on the exact same path, varying only slightly in some areas. Many that had repaired damage and rebuild from last year lost everything once again. It is just so sad anytime this type of thing happens. About 5 years ago we had a tornado go directly over our home. We live in a little valley and the tornado sucked up our neighbors garage, jumped off the ground and took the tops off the trees off around our home, but hit the ground on the other side of our property. My husband and I were out on a date when it hit. I praise God for sparing my children. Needless to say when there is bad weather our animals and children now are just really scared. They have seen it so many times. They know to pray and trust in God. We have an area of our home to go to in case we hear the tornado sirens. But both this year and last year we never heard the sirens the wind was so loud and powerful. We heard the train sound and felt the air pressure change. I always put pillows all over my son who is in a wheel chair as he is so big there is no way to quickly and safely get him out of his chair and covered up. I stand over him to try to protect his head just in case. Praise God we have never lost more than trees and some roofing pealed back. I Praise God for his sparing us but we have seen time and time again first hand the landscape changed, homes gone and never rebuild by powerful tornado's in our area. I pray God be with all those across the nation who are in the stages of clean up and dealing with such loss. There has only been a small amount of clean up and rebuilding done in our area as many had no insurance. May Gods mighty hand of protection be over our nation in His mercy and grace and may many souls come to Him thru all that has went happened. God be with you, susan

I haven't been directly involved in a tornado but as close as we got to one was pretty darn scary. I was a young teen at the time and we were camping in our RV in Minnesota. My mom had been following the storm for a long time on the tv and I think it had developed a tornado but I can't remember specifically. I remember putting all the stuff we had out in secure spots. And then watching to see if we needed to go to the shelter. We didn't go because my moms boyfriend at the time didn't feel it was necessary but us kids wanted to go. The storm hit and that camper was rocking, I think on 2 wheels, and we were praying and telling stories to try to not be so scared. The doorbell rang, who has one of those on a camper anyway? We did. My mom's boyfriend at the time thought it was a rescue and opened the door. He was quickly pulled out of the camper by the wind catching the door. After it was over his body print was in the door he got sucked out and banged so hard. Anyway, no one was there and he slowly got back inside and wasn't injured, bruised maybe but no broken bones or anything. I think god rang that doorbell though because after the door was opened the windshield blew out and the camper quit rocking and we rode out the rest of the storm a bit easier. Afterwards there was many campers destroyed. Our sustained quite a bit of damage but we had not pulled our vehicle behind this time so we had to drive home in the rain with no windshield which really hurt. We made it to my mom's work and then her boss drove us home. The camper was totaled because the walls were so warped from the wind and rain driving in them. It was straight line winds with out a tornado but still destructive and dangerous. Still don't enjoy storms while camping I will head to the shelter probably long before necessary now and just wait it out.