Brief report....forecast area verified and vilified.
Much longer (but bear wtih me here): Choosing which storm was which in outflow early on made identification of storm structures very difficult. Shelf cloud after shelf cloud put out accesory cloud structures that looked like wall clouds, but when under them, the winds were cold out of the north and were clearly not updrafts. I'm sure some of them augmented updraft bases, but structure identification was truly impossible.
Radar provided the guidance, but that meant heading east on I-44 with risk of some RFD punching. We interfaced w/ Cloud 9, and George K helped with navigation. We were there right after the tornado hit. By right after, I mean <5 minutes. Initial hopes that the tornado had only grazed Joplin (with a sign blown down here, and a semi on its side there) were abandoned when we came across semis clearly thrown from the road by tornadic-level winds. Semis, in this case, worked out to about 15 that I saw scattered over the highway.
Uniformly it was clear from the devestation that that our chase was over. Cloud 9 went into a first responder mode with Mike Ratliff taking at least one of the truckers to a staging area. Myself and chase partner Robert Balogh (also a physician) approached a police officer to ask where incident command was. He informed us that St. Johns, a large hospital and one of only two in the area had been destroyed. We reported to the Freeman Hospital ER, and began what was a marathon of patient care. Each of cared for at least 40-50 patients with at least 7 fatalities total from both groups. Upward scaling the injury count, there were easily 1,000 injured (most minor, of course) coupled with the need to also take in one large hospital's worth of patients and one nursing home's patients (both were destroyed). I'm way too tired to type this out right now, but need to debrief a little. In short, the hospital was a blood bath in a way I'd never even considered possible. As was anticipated by their ER, a mass casualty incident would involve combined efforts of the two hospitals in Joplin plus outlying hospitals. No scenario considered one whole hospital destroyed.
The staff I worked with down to every single one were impeccable, appreciative, effective, and efficient. On that level, it was ballet. On the other, seeing children die, gruesome injuries beyond what I'll discuss here, and seeing the reality of this phase of post-storm devestation left me crying at one point. We worked until we started making mistakes, and then spent an hour discussing the day together because there was no sleep in us.
It's difficult to tell you the hard duality of the tornado. It was wished for in almost all aspects. I really picked my target carefully. I felt elated at seeing the TCu become Cbs, and all of this early in the day. Then there was the reality of what was wished for manifesting itself in reality. The hospital work really felt inifinite and I could tell I couldn't work indefinitely. I had to leave, but felt the pain that this disaster will not be leaving anytime soon for those in Joplin (even while we left major trauma continued to arrive) left me feeling the tornado so intensely sad.
Hospital workers there didn't even know the fate of their own families: cell service was down for many hours, and due to the hospital's need to run on generator power, most of the electrical outlets didn't work and the telephone network was down. And yet, there was no end to the enormous dedication to patients. People who may have lost everything kept tending to their neighbors. Perhaps that was the most heart wrenching thing: people recognizing friends who were injured or worse. But they kept working. I felt humbled by their work. I knew my role would have to end though. I checked out my patients to one of the MDs and just like that I'm suddenly sitting in a clean hotel room in N/C OK. Lights are on, wireless network is great. Joplin is literally 100 miles away.
While driving here, Robert was shocked to hear that I was going to chase on 5/23 and 5/24. After what we'd seen, how could the reasonable person chase? I had to think about that, and then realized why. I didn't cause the storm by wishing for it, and had it not been there, Robert and I wouldn't have been there either to help. Karma. I'll chase again (if I sleep). But I'll never ever forget what happened today in a way I've never appreciated so deeply.
Anyway, forgive the rant...before today, I'd only seen a couple (at most) injuries from storms. Today was apocolyptic....
Last: Cloud 9 was amazing in STOPPING a chase tour to render aid. That was so deeply touching. I just don't have enough words about my gratitude for seeing people do what they could.
