Rodney Manley
The Macon Telegraph, Ga.
LOTHAIR, Ga. — Lonzie Parks pulled a work boot from the rubble, tossed it into a green, Tupperware tub, then started searching for its match.
Parks has been here before, at this point of starting over. Almost 10 years ago, it was a fire.
“I lost everything in it, wasn’t nothing standing but the chimney,” Parks, 54, said Sunday.
This time, a tornado left Parks’ home in ruin.
“At least I can go in there and find stuff,” he said.
National Weather Service meteorologist Sean Ryan confirmed Sunday that the storms that roared through Middle Georgia Saturday night, bringing some much-needed rainfall, spawned at least two tornadoes. One downed trees and damaged a mobile home in Dodge County, Ryan said.
The second one touched down about 20 minutes later, at 10:41 p.m., a mile south of this small Treutlen County town. The twister strengthened to an F-2 rating (minimum winds of 113 mph) before slamming into the volunteer fire station on Ga. 199, Ryan said.
The tornado blew away the walls, steel beams and roof of the station and ripped up some of the concrete floor. The two fire trucks suffered minor damage, with the older Ford model getting the worst of it.
“It ought to be fun finding a windshield for this old thing,” said fireman Jason Page.
The winds knocked over a full propane tank at the station, causing a leak that had emergency crews clearing trees in darkness Saturday night for fear that lights might spark a fire, Page said. One tree landed on a Treutlen sheriff’s deputy’s cruiser parked at a nearby home, he said.
The twister cut a 2.6-mile path, 200 yards wide at some points, the weather service’s Ryan said.
That trail ended at the John Deere Lane property where Parks lived in a trailer behind his sister’s wood-frame house.
Parks said he was sitting in his recliner when his sister called to warn him of the storm.
“All of a sudden, the house started shaking and the back porch came over the house.”
The twister flipped the trailer into the air and ripped off the roof, he said. The floor of the home landed upright, about 40 feet away. Parks landed back in his recliner, unharmed except for a sore shoulder.
“It sat me up in that chair,” Parks said. “I waited until it calmed down, and I crawled out.
“I couldn’t do nothing but ride it out, and it was a rough ride.”
His sister, Katheryn Powell, 59, said she sought cover when the winds began tossing items around in her home. “I laid on the floor and covered my head,” she said.
The twister knocked her home 10 feet off its foundation. The house also appeared to have been snapped in two where the front section of the home joined the rear.
Powell said she was trapped in the home until her brother kicked open the front door.
The local American Red Cross office gave both Parks and Powell vouchers to buy clothing \and personal items at the Wal-Mart store about 25 miles away in Dublin.
The National Weather Service said a possible tornado in Wilcox County destroyed a mobile home near Rochelle and ripped the roof off a home near Abbeville.
The damage was less severe in Telfair and Laurens counties.
“We had trees down but, as far as I know, no structural damage,” said Laurens County sheriff’s Sgt. James Pettis.
There were scattered power outages along the storm’s path. An official with Little Ocmulgee Electric Membership Corp. reported “off and on” outages Sunday in parts of Laurens, Dodge and Wheeler counties. A Georgia Power spokeswoman said 10 residences in its service area east of Macon remained without power Sunday afternoon.
Copyright 2007 The Macon Telegraph