If there is one thing you learn when living in Alabama, it’s how to deal with tornadoes. They are a regular part of our lives and can strike at almost any time during the year. They only last a handful of minutes, but their legacy is never forgotten. I have known many places and quite a few people affected by these terrible twisters, but there is one Alabama memory that overshadows all others when speaking of this disaster. The twister that forever changed my life and the lives of my family and friends hit at 4:30 PM on November 15, 1989, in Huntsville, Alabama.
It has been some time since I reflected on this surreal story, but reflection is good for the soul I’m told. I remember I was employed with JC Penney as a manager trainee in the Fall of that year. I was at work and my new wife was home in our apartment. We were both on the northwest side of Huntsville when the tornado warning was announced. I did not know it, but at the moment I heard the warning sound the tornado was already gone and all of the damage had been done.
{To read an account and see some photos of the infamous Category 4 you can go here or here. To read other stories you can go here or here.}
After working her shift at a local hospital in Huntsville, a good friend of ours and the maid of honor at our wedding five months prior was sound asleep in her upstairs apartment in Waterford Square. She would never wake up. At 4:30 PM the category F4 tornado crossed Memorial Parkway packing 250 mph winds. It hit her apartment head on smashing her and the entire building in seconds. I am sure she never knew what hit her. After traveling another 16 miles more on the ground the funnel lifted back into the sky and the whole thing was over, for some. For everyone else the long and extremely difficult night had just begun.
After contacting parents and other family members my wife and I were able to determine that almost everyone was okay. However, one of our close friends, Steve, had still not been able to get in touch with his fiance of two weeks, Vanessa. As the night progressed we started to fear the worst. We went to his house to join him as we waited for news. After some time it came. Vanessa was dead. I still weep as I think back on that horrible feeling that washed over me the moment I found out. I remember exactly where I was standing in Steve’s house. I also remember the very, very long week that followed. Don’t get me wrong, there was a lot of love and a lot of encouragement for all of those affected by this tragedy, but Vanessa was no longer present with us, and that hurt more than any words can ever begin to describe.
My wife, who lost her best friend, went with others the following day to see what they could salvage from the wreckage. All of them came back stunned and silent. It was more overwhelming than they ever imagined, total destruction.
So, I will post this blog with teary eyes as I remember Vanessa Hastings-Poole and everything she meant to Steve, my wife, myself, and countless others. I will post this blog seventeen years later at the exact time the tornado took her life on that dreadful day in 1989. I will post it in her honor and with reverence for the One who took her out of this world at such an early age. For no matter how much we may strive and strain to control our lives, ultimately we cannot. This particular story is vivid evidence toward that fact.
From my desktop to yours, it’s another Alabama memory.
