Published: May 25, 2008 12:31 am         

Residents, pigs and congregation victims to twisters

Cleanup efforts started almost immediately as people picked through the rubble Saturday left by several damaging tornadoes.

At a Seaboard Foods hog farm northwest of Lacey in Kingfisher County, workers were trying to save sows and piglets in several barns de-stroyed or damaged by a tornado that hit Saturday afternoon.

The twister completely leveled the farm’s south barns and ripped the roof off several others. Less than a mile north, another barn was left mostly unharmed.

Joe Popplewell, farm manager, said the struggle would be clearing debris to reach the pigs before they starve or dehydrate. Workers started the rescue effort about an hour after the tornado struck. The surviving hogs will be taken to another farm.

In the southernmost barn, the roof had been shredded and the walls were destroyed, leaving only the sows and their piglets in the farrowing pens, which provided enough protection to keep many of the animals from harm.

However, Popplewell said the barns were a loss.

“I can’t think of the total cost right away, but it will be in the millions,” he said.

Mik Gilbert, who was one of about six workers at the farm when the storm struck, said he was unaware he was in the tornado’s path until it was nearly on top of him.

He was vaccinating pigs in one of the barns when he stepped outside and noticed “it had just started raining out of nowhere.”

He spotted the funnel and immediately ran to shelter in the farm’s office, where there were no windows.



Riding out the storm



Several tornadoes caused damage across southern Garfield County.

Jerry Taylor, who lives two miles east of Oklahoma 74 on Bison Road, was watching the storm from a hill near his house and saw one tornado as it changed course. He suddenly found himself sitting directly in its path.

“Everything turned black,” he said.

He drove home and had just stepped in his front door when windows shattered and the tin roof he had finished putting on earlier in the day was ripped from the wooden beams it was nailed to.

Taylor said he was on the phone with a friend when the tornado came through. He was briefly trapped in his home but was uninjured.

Taylor was offered a hotel room by American Red Cross, but he refused.

“I’m staying home tonight,” he said.

Oklahoma 74 was closed for a time after a tornado ripped a trailer from its foundation at Prime Operating Co., southeast of Douglas, leaving its contents scattered across the highway.



Faith shines through



Potter Church, which was several miles east of Taylor’s house, was not as fortunate.

All that remained of the church were the cement steps that led to the church entrance and the foundation. The building itself was blown off the foundation and lay in a heap several yards away.

The church was formed in the early 1920s by Ernest Caudle. It has about 10 members, according to Sandra Kenaston, a member of the congregation.

Kenaston said there would be a service at 9:30 a.m. today, just like usual. Members will meet on the steps and the bare foundation.

A hymnal page was ripped from its binding by the tornado and wrapped around the church’s sign post. The song on the page, “Now I Belong to Jesus,” will be sung by the congregation this morning, said Kenaston, whose home just a mile south of the church was not touched.