Four hurt by Friday tornado; 159 homes damaged on Fort Leonard Wood

FORT LEONARD WOOD, Mo. (Dec. 31, 2010) — Post spokesman Jeff Maddy announced Friday evening that a survey of damaged and destroyed housing conducted by a specialized disaster response team from Columbia found nobody trapped. Only four people were hurt on Fort Leonard Wood by the New Year’s Eve tornado and all of those injuries were minor, Maddy said. Post officials noted that many Fort Leonard Wood servicemembers and families were away from the installation for holiday leave, and in many cases the houses destroyed by the tornado were empty. None of the injuries involved trainees. That section of the post wasn’t damaged by the tornado, Maddy said, and military training operations for both basic training and AIT are expected to resume Jan. 3. A total of 159 homes were damaged, with 41 destroyed and 32 others with significant damage, according to an announcement posted by Col. Charles Williams, the post’s garrison commander.

Grew up in Oklahoma and Missouri - toronados were a part of life.

I’m so thankful no one was killed and no one seriously hurt.

Modern methods of predicting and tracking tornados and enhanced warning systems really make a difference. As a chid in about the 6th grade I remember going with my Dad to a small town in Oklahoma where a Tornado had set down at one end of the town and more or less wiped out the whole town end to end. A lot of people had gathered in the Methodist church and it was also destroyed, killing and injuring many - although it apparently held together enough to protect most of the lives it sheltered. People in their individual storm shelters (which were common it those days) were largely unhurt. The town was leveled though - just flattened. I’ll never forget that sight.

Our church had a big disaster relief van stocked with first aid supplies, food, clothing, water, household goods, etc. that went to these disasters. My Dad always went with it. He took me rather frequently once I was old enough to be helpful.

I have the UTMOST respect for tornados. Those guys on TV who chase them are absolutely idiots. A funnel can loop and jump and skip about - completely unpredictable.

I am a survivor of basic training at Little Korea in Jan - Feb 1962. We experienced every miserable form of weather especially freezing rain as we slithered through the barb wire entangled infiltration course while drill sergeants gleefully fired machine guns over our prone bodies. Thankfully there were no tornadoes as our barracks were poorly constructed of wood during WWII; we never would have survived.

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