This is extremely similar to what happened to me as a student in Iowa City on 4/13/06 (tornado wasn't as strong -- an extremely high end F2 hit downtown IC -- but also well after dark with quite a bit of drama)
This brings back quite a few memories... (sorry if this runs on a bit, I guess I felt a bit inspired to write of the event)
I was in the lower level of an apartment complex sitting west of the Tornado and downtown. Sirens were blaring, big hail and tons of lightning. And then things slow down with the hail. And power to the city goes out. And I get a phone call that a tornado has been spotted not too far from the city. Pretty soon, the lights in the city go out. Sirens still blaring. I've never heard them go on this long. I've heard lots of sirens blaring before, they usually do their thing once and stop; not today. A couple seconds later, the lights flicker in our complex. Then out completely. Pitch dark and silent aside from the sirens blaring.
People start screaming tornado. It's back over the roof line across some of the downtown buildings and is approaching quickly. I vaguely see it but certainly sense it. I'm standing right outside the first floor apartment entrance taking all this in. With mass panic ensuing around me, I take a step inside to seek shelter in the first floor hallway. About 40 or 50 nervous people are jammed in there as well -- the hallway was empty a couple of minutes ago.
And it hits me: we're going to get hit by a damned tornado... for real. To this point in my life I hadn't observed a real tornado, much less been a part of one. I'd always followed severe weather locally, I'd seen the warnings, heard the sirens, even seen the damage -- but not mine. Tornadoes apparently always happened to "somebody else." But not today.
Back in the apartment, winds start to pick up, though they weren't too loud. The people inside were apparently too loud to notice any winds that there might have been audible. (and they were there, as missing pieces of our roof later provided great evidence of) Here's the scary part though; (aside from the waiting in the pitch black) the suction. The vacuum effect; the pressure drop. This was absolutely remarkable and is something I'll never forget -- it sent chills down the back of my spine. All the doors in our complex sucked shut. Some force much larger than us, the apartment or anything in Iowa City at that moment was lurking just yards away. I honestly feared for my life. I felt completely out of control; complete vulnerableness -- more so than I'd ever felt before in my life. Flat out fear. Dread.
I braced myself against the narrow apartment hallway walls along with every other terrified soul in there. I remember worrying about being trapped should the walls collapse around me. Please don't let the walls collapse. I've got a bit of a claustrophobic streak in me and that wouldn't be much fun. Those thoughts were racing through my mind as well as thoughts of the $!&$*@$ nature directed towards my landlord, who in their infinite wisdom somehow didn't think it wise to leave the basement door unlocked in a property located in the heart of the midwest in the spring time. Apparently they too believed tornadoes always happened to "somebody else."
Another notable item I remembered was being on the phone the entire time with my dad who had been relaying me updates about the severe weather from Cedar Rapids. I'd kept him up to date on my situation through out the evening. He's on the phone asking me "what's happening" as I'm getting hit by the tornado -- my response to him was: "I'm getting hit by a tornado!" I'm not sure if he ever heard that. Lots of folk were screaming, and I'm sure the winds were roaring on top of that. At least he helped to keep my mind of the possibilities of collapsed walls...
The strong F2 tornado soon passed our complex and let go of our doors so that we might peak outside. And a few brave -- possibly stupid -- souls did. With the wind howling a few kids stuck their heads outside -- they just had to see "it." Seeing that their heads weren't quickly lobbed off, I did the same and saw "it." I again "kind of sort of" saw the tornado as it plowed ENE. I remember seeing a good amount of debri in the air, I could hear the tornado's roar better. Now I was amazed. I just got hit by a damned tornado!
The rest of the night was a blur. It's rather surreal to see your town halfway torn up and thrown into chaos that quickly. Within a couple minutes of the tornado's end, we hear emergency sirens and smell gas. People start to crawl out. I didn't feel too safe and got the heck out of the area where the gas smell seemed to be emanating from. It was a neighboring apartment complex, they took a bigger hit than us. Thankfully our complex was relatively unharmed, just had the roof roughed up a bit. Apparently the worst damage in our area was just a half a block north or so at an intersection with a gas-station. It could have been worse for us.
This event absolutely took my half-assed life long interest in severe weather and turned it into a passion. I found Stormtrack a few days after the event while trying to get a hand on any sort of video, picture or report I could. I soon became hooked on the message board -- you guys were severe weather geeks that knew your stuff! What a great resource. I wanted to do what you guys could do; understand, forecast and see severe weather.
Looking back now on the event, I suppose I wouldn't have been so scared. I suppose I would have known that this probably wasn't the sort of possibly high end F3 or F4 needed to topple our apartment. Heck, I would have known that a severe weather event of the magnitude that unfolded on 4/13/06 was rather unlikely given what seemed to be the day's setup -- I would have been thrilled to be getting this.
At any rate, I feel that this is about as "real" as it gets minus the severe property damage or, God forbid, the loss of life. I highly doubt I'll match the drama I endured that night any time soon severe weather wise -- at least I'll plan to try and keep it that way.
