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I'm speechless!  Be safe.

 
Wow Mike, those photos perfectly demonstrate the awesome power of nature.

Two of the folks killed here in Arkansas were about 4 blocks from our house...we had no damage at all.  Tornadoes are just so damn strange and ruthless.  The devastation where Mike is in Bama speaks for itself.  You are 100% right there mnorman, ol pal.  We and our possesions are fragile and tenuous ol things.

Kudos for being there to help Mike - those pictures are excellent, but disturbing...  I can't imagine what those poor people are going through...

  Thanks Mike for posting the pictures.Hope your in bed by now...
 
 It boggles my mind how all of those people found a place to stay so quickly after their houses were destroyed,at least I hope that people aren't still sitting in a pile of rubble.

  I don't remember these types of storms killing this many people or this number of tornados going places where they typically never go.............and May is usually considered tornado month,not April.

 

Getting the word out is a vital job, too.  Don't sell yourself short.  Some of those people may be there to help because they saw your report.

It's always amazed me on how something like that can rip through and total a house but leave 1 doorway standing.
Best wishes to all those who were effected by this disaster.

Mike

Horrible situation there Mike...my heart goes out to everyone out there as well as my prayers. You know what always seems to get me...ever notice when people post up pics after a tornado or something, in the background...the most blue sky, the fluffiest clouds...like a post card....and then you see the debris all over the place, cars upside down...all I can say is dear God please help these people. :(

I do have a question for those of you that live in areas like this.....why do you stay there? I don't mean that sarcastically, I'm seriously curious as to why people stay in areas where they know that at any given time, a tornado can come and destroy their lives, stay there? I think I would really have a problem knowing that and still living in a place where it was a possibility. I had a beautiful house in Florida in an area that hadn't been hit by a hurricane in over 20 some years. As soon as I buy it, here came the hurricane. It didn't damage me or anyone else around where I was, but that was enough for me to say "you know what...even though I have great insurance, I really don't think I could deal with losing everything." I've been down that road...and if any of you have lost it all and started over again it's demoralizing. Some things can never get replaced not to mention the most important...possibly losing your life. I could never live in Cali because you know it's only a matter of time and an earthquake is going to destroy that place. I hope it never happens and I never see it in this lifetime, but the possibility is there.

What are your thoughts, those of you that live in dangerous "nature destructive" type areas?

Wow that's something else, I've seen a few small ones, lost a roof about 8 years ago in one. Never seen anything like that though. Great to see folks lending a helping hand.
Danny, my thoughts on it are. That is not a place where that type of activity is real common, not even in tornado alley I think. There is no place safe from nature.

Every place has their own buggabears.  California - mud slides, earthquakes, fires.  Just about the whole mid section of the US is libel to be hit by a tornado.  Coast line - hurricanes.  New Jersey - chemical leaks ;-).  The only earth quake I've ever been in was in NY City, just up the street from CBGB's.  Pick your poisine.

I lived in Tuscaloosa, too.  Didn't like it much, but they didn't deserve this.  Nobody does.

Be safe, Mike.  Unlike lightening, tornadoes do strike the same place twice!

@

I do have a question for those of you that live in areas like this.....why do you stay there?

Is there any place that is not subject to disaster though?  Out west there is earthquakes, middle in torandoes, south and east hurricanes

granted some places are worse than others, but none that are really safe I don't think.

.

So, no place is really all that safe....

Indeed, South East England is probably one of the most sedate places on the face of the planet as far as avoiding the extremest quirks of mother nature go, and yet I've lived through a severe Hurricane and a Tornado both events being life-threatening for real.

We also had a minor quake fairly recently and a freak 4 foot wave at an average high tide would be enough to wash away the 5 square mile settlement I live in.

Sometimes there just ain't nowhere to run.

The feature of the Tornado that kind of bugged me was that short of the few of us in it's direct path nobody else knew that anything had happened and yet on it's path it had sufficient power to pull up a 100 year old tree, tap root and all!   Unlike the Hurricane which was relentless for several hours this was sheer terror concentrated into a couple of minutes and at one point I truly believed that my contract to appear on this Earth was over.

That is a trauma that some will be facing that even those living fairly close by can have little comprehension of.

Was the one that struck Tuscaloosa the same one that had a 178 mile long run?  that thing was huge!!!

The one that I distinctly remember up here was in 1978 when my parents, my sisters and i went to the basement ...and I saw out the front window nothing but this black wall of whatever it was across from us...when we came back out a few minutes later there was absolute quiet and nothing across from us but ruin....it took out our neighbour's homes across the street from us but left ours .....