‘I’m alive’: Kokomo residents thankful to have survived Indiana tornadoes
KOKOMO — To 3-year-old Harmony McGee, the Red Cross Disaster Relief Center in Kokomo feels more like a resort than refuge.
"She thinks we're having fun," her father, Christopher McGee, said Thursday, standing outside the Kokomo Event and Conference Center, where the Red Cross has taken in hundreds of people displaced by a rash of devastating tornadoes. "She thinks we're having a vacation from the crib."
McGee, 23, moved to Kokomo from Chicago with his wife and daughter a few months ago. The young family made their home in the Garden Square apartments, one of the areas hit hardest by an EF3 tornado that spit out wind speeds of up to 165 mph.
"At first, I was overwhelmed," McGee said of being evacuated from his home. "I was kind of mad, but also happy ain’t nobody lose their life. I knew my baby and my girl would be safe."
At least eight tornadoes ripped through the state Wednesday, the National Weather Service reported, hitting Hendricks, Boone, Hamilton, Tipton and Howard counties. Kokomo emerged as the hardest hit area.
The tornado’s destructive path left behind a tang of musty clothes, damp wood, churned earth and the hot asphalt coating of roof shingles—a smell most residents of the Cedar Crest neighborhood, a mile west of Garden Square, became accustomed to by Thursday, as they began sorting through what was left of their homes.
And while some people lost everything, many others, like Becki Sweeney, were thankful to survive the night.
"I'm alive," she kept repeating to herself, standing in what was once her dining room. She was thumbing through her address book she’d retrieved from a drawer in the bureau. Above her, only blue sky. The tornado had detached her home's roof and tossed it into her backyard.
Sweeney, 54, was at work when she heard the sirens. But it wasn't the threat of tornadoes she was worried about; it was Bella, her 5-year-old Yorkiepoo.
After the first round of devastating storms passed, and when the all-clear was given, Sweeney made her way to her home in the 1400 block of Belvedere Drive.
Sweeney's neighbors stood in her front yard waiting.
Bella was with them. They had found the dog lying on Sweeney’s bed, surrounded by broken glass and crumbled walls, unscathed.
"I fell into my neighbor's arms as soon as I found out she was OK," Sweeney said Thursday morning.
Just 10 to 15 people suffered only minor injuries after the storms, said Howard County Sheriff Steve Rogers during a Thursday news conference. Still, the storms damaged homes and two apartment complexes in Kokomo, forcing about 220 people into temporary shelters overnight.
While large swaths of the city escaped the storms untouched, downed power lines left more than 17,000 people without electricity. Many traffic signals were replaced by Indiana State Police troopers directing cars through intersections.
Throughout the afternoon, contractors and electricians filed into the neighborhood. Some were local, others had signs on the side of their trucks that said they hailed from Fort Wayne and Indianapolis. People walked the streets in old, tattered clothes, ready to help neighbors lift tree branches off cars or pull siding out of bushes.
The hum of chainsaws was constant, overpowered only when Gov. Mike Pence's helicopter flew in low overhead and landed at the old General Motors Co. plant.
Pence visited with people in Cedar Crest before making an appearance at the disaster relief center.
Rebecca Topper, accompanied by her best friend's daughter, Aaliyah Peachee, pulled a Radio Flyer wagon filled with water and doughnuts down the middle of Belvedere Drive, offering snacks to volunteers to show their appreciation.
"The officers, and people out here, they don't have anything," Topper said. "They haven't left since this started yesterday. So, if the least we can do is offer them some water and some doughnuts ... while they're here, it just makes me feel a little bit better."
Topper, whose house made it through the storm in one piece, said she has lived through hurricanes, but this storm was different.
"This was scary," she said. "It makes your heart break for these people. You just want to help in what way you can."
Sweeney, like many others in Cedar Crest, returned to her house Thursday to begin combing through the wreckage of the place she'd called home for 16 years. She wanted to try to save her photographs, she said, and a little stuffed animal that belonged to her mother.
The damage followed a similar path to the tornadoes that struck the city in November 2013, Kokomo Mayor Greg Goodnight said at the news conference.
"Our hearts are with the people who have experienced this twice," Goodnight said.
Bettie Johnson, a longtime Cedar Crest resident, witnessed both storms. Wednesday’s tornado, she said, was a lot worse.
“Oh, it’s terrible. It’s terrible,” Johnson told IndyStar. “I had a nice, great big tree back there in the back, and it’s uprooted. And my tulip tree is uprooted.”
Johnson, 88, has lived at her home for more than 40 years. She was spared the last time storms blew through her area, but this time, she said, she wasn’t so lucky. Massive tree branches blanketed her front yard, some leaning up against her single-story home. Her front gutter had shaken loose and dangled on the eave.
“I’m going to stay here, but we’re trying to get ahold of the insurance companies and find out what to do,” Johnson said.
And, like Sweeney, Johnson has found a silver lining: “I could’ve had no house at all."
Later in the afternoon, back at the relief center, a number of Indianapolis Colts players and cheerleaders showed up to sign footballs and hang out with the kids at the shelter.
"People are so generous," said Sandy Lyle, a Red Cross volunteer. "The people that are in the shelters are very grateful for all the things they've done."
Lyle, 75, who lives in Carmel, has been volunteering with the Red Cross for 40 years. When IndyStar spoke with her Thursday evening, she'd been up for 40 hours.
Witnessing the overwhelming generosity from the community, she said, makes it all worth it.
Red Cross officials said many of the people staying at the shelter have been coming and going throughout the day, checking in to see whether or not they'd be able to go back to their homes, or at least grab essential items such as medications to bring back to the center. The YMCA has also provided an off-site shower location for families to bathe, officials said, and a transportation company in the city has volunteered to shuttle the displaced back and forth.
As of Thursday night, it was still unclear how many homes had been destroyed, but officials said the shelter has plenty room and food to care for anyone still needing assistance.
The Associated Press contributed to this story.
Call IndyStar reporter Michael Anthony Adams at (317) 444-6123. Follow him on Twitter: @michaeladams317.