Cellphone alerts helped Tennessee couple escape to basement
Teresa M. Walker | Hagadone News Network | UPDATED 4 years, 8 months AGO
This Santa bear came to rest in the splinter of a tree in the Locust Grove area just off Highway 70 west of Cookeville, Tenn.,Tuesday, March 3, 2020. (Jack McNeely/The Herald-Citizen via AP)
A road separates properties filled with debris Tuesday, March 3, 2020, near Lebanon, Tenn. Tornadoes ripped across Tennessee early Tuesday, shredding more than 140 buildings and burying people in piles of rubble and wrecked basements. (AP Photo/Mark Humphrey)
People work to salvage items Tuesday, March 3, 2020, near Cookeville, Tenn. Tornadoes ripped across Tennessee early Tuesday, shredding more than 140 buildings and burying people in piles of rubble and wrecked basements. (AP Photo/Mark Humphrey)
In this Tuesday, March 3, 2020 photo, Billy Dyer of Baxter, Tenn., stands beside his home damaged by an early morning tornado, in Baxter, Tenn. The walls on the upper floor around his bedroom are gone. Cell phone emergency alerts gave him and his wife enough time to get to the basement. Tornadoes that struck Tennessee early Tuesday killed at least 24 with an unspecified number of people still missing. (AP Photo/Teresa M. Walker)
Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee, left, prays with Kayla Cowen, right, as Cowen looks through rubble in hopes of finding a neighbor Tuesday, March 3, 2020, near Cookeville, Tenn. Lee was touring damaged areas and met Cowen as she was searching. Tornadoes ripped across Tennessee early Tuesday, shredding buildings and burying people in piles of rubble and wrecked basements. (AP Photo/Mark Humphrey)
A man looks for items he can salvage from his store Tuesday, March 3, 2020, near Cookeville, Tenn. Tornadoes ripped across Tennessee early Tuesday, shredding more than 140 buildings and burying people in piles of rubble and wrecked basements. At least 22 people were killed. (AP Photo/Mark Humphrey)
Emergency rescue personnel search for the missing in Cookville, Tenn., where several homes exploded from their foundations during the powerful storm Tuesday, March 3, 2020. (Jack McNeely/The Herald-Citizen via AP)
In this Tuesday, March 3, 2020 photo, Nicole (last name not given) looks through her refrigerator after it was ripped out of her home at Underwood St. and 16th Ave. N. after a tornado ripped a wall off in the Elizabeth Park neighborhood of Nashville, Tenn. (George Walker IV/The Tennessean via AP)
A destroyed business stands Tuesday, March 3, 2020, near Lebanon, Tenn. Tornadoes ripped across Tennessee early Tuesday, shredding more than 140 buildings and burying people in piles of rubble and wrecked basements. At least 22 people were killed. (AP Photo/Mark Humphrey)
A worker searches for victims among the rubble in an area where several people were killed by storms Tuesday, March 3, 2020, near Cookeville, Tenn. Tornadoes ripped across Tennessee early Tuesday, shredding more than 140 buildings and burying people in piles of rubble and wrecked basements. At least 22 people were killed. (AP Photo/Mark Humphrey)
In this Tuesday, March 3, 2020 photo, Sid Osborne surveys the damage at his home on Hunters Hill Rd. after a tornado ripped through the Donelson neighborhood in Nashville, Tenn. (George Walker IV/The Tennessean via AP)
In this Tuesday, March 3, 2020 photo, Henry Watts works to remove debris from his home after a tornado ripped through the Stanford Estates Neighborhood near Donelson Christian Academy in Nashville, Tenn. (George Walker IV/The Tennessean via AP)
In this Tuesday, March 3, 2020 photo, residents of a home at Underwood St. and 16th Ave. N. try to figure out their next steps after a tornado ripped a wall off their home in the Elizabeth Park neighborhood of Nashville, Tenn. (George Walker IV/The Tennessean via AP)
This Tuesday, March 3, 2020 aerial photo shows Mt. Juliet after a tornado ripped through Middle Tennessee in Nashville, Tenn. (George Walker IV The Tennessean via AP)
In this Tuesday, March 3, 2020 photo, Ann Hooven and her granddaughter Caroline Hooven survey the damage at their home on Hunters Hill Rd. after a tornado ripped through the Donelson neighborhood of Nashville, Tenn. (George Walker IV/The Tennessean via AP)
In this Tuesday, March 3, 2020 photo, residents check their homes and each other along 16th Ave. N after a tornado hit the Elizabeth Park neighborhood of Nashville, Tenn. (George Walker IV/The Tennessean via AP)
This Tuesday, March 3, 2020 aerial photo shows the Stanford Estates neighborhood near Donelson Christian Academy after a tornado ripped through Nashville, Tenn. George Walker IV/The Tennessean via AP)
This Tuesday, March 3, 2020 aerial photo shows the Hermitage neighborhood after a tornado ripped through Nashville, Tenn. (George Walker IV/The Tennessean via AP)
In this Tuesday, March 3, 2020 photo, Carlos Barquero cuts trees that damaged his home on Hunters Hill Rd. after a tornado ripped through the Donelson neighborhood in Nashville, Tenn. (George Walker IV/The Tennessean via AP)
BAXTER, Tenn. (AP) — Billy Dyer's cellphone blared out an emergency alert, then his wife Kathy's phone followed, giving them just enough time to get downstairs and flip on a TV to check the news.
Then the tornado hit.
When the sun rose Tuesday morning, the Dyers emerged to find the walls around their corner bedroom gone. Their mattress was perched precariously on their bed's headboard, with only sky all around.
“Thank God we had enough time to get downstairs to the basement or we would probably not be here,” Dyer said.
State emergency officials said 24 people died when fast-moving storms crossed Tennessee early Tuesday. Eighteen of them, including five pre-teen children, died in Putnam County, some 80 miles (130 kilometers) east of Nashville. Eighty-eight more were injured in the county.
The twister that hit Putnam County was classified EF-4, the second strongest, with winds of 175 mph, the National Weather Service said Wednesday evening.
The number of people unaccounted for dropped to three from 21, Putnam County Mayor Randy Porter said late Wednesday afternoon. The search is about 90% complete, Putnam County Sheriff Eddie Farris said.
“We have made some great progress today,” Porter said, adding it was a “time-consuming process" tracking down those still unaccounted for.
People across Nashville were awakened by outdoor sirens warning of the tornado danger early Tuesday. Sirens also sounded in parts of Putnam County, but in the Dyers' Double Springs community, deep in the countryside, no such systems exist.
“If the cellphones didn't have the emergency call, it wouldn't have been good,” Dyer said.
The twisters ripped off brick facades, bent metal poles and shredded more than 140 buildings while burying people in piles of rubble and wrecked basements.
John C. Tune Airport, a smaller airport in Nashville that generally serves corporate and private aircraft, estimated $93 million in infrastructure damage, not accounting for 90 destroyed aircraft and other damaged vehicles. Nashville International Airport emerged unscathed.
In Nashville, 33,000 customers remained without power Wednesday, and Nashville Electric Service said most customers able to still receive power will be restored by Monday.
The storm has spurred an outpouring of private donations, including $1 million from Tennessee Titans controlling owner Amy Adams Strunk and the Titans Foundation.
Dyer's own 34-year-old daughter, Brooke, sheltred in the basement of the house he grew up in next door, and then “called me screaming and crying.” Moments after the tornado passed, he ventured out in the dark and freed her from the rubble.
“Thank God my mother had a basement, a very small basement,” the 64-year-old Dyer said. “She was standing there between the crack of the door screaming and crying, top of the house gone.”
Gov. Bill Lee declared an emergency, sent the National Guard to assist search-and-rescue efforts and ordered flags over the state Capitol to fly at half-staff until Friday for those killed. President Donald Trump, who plans to visit Friday, tweeted: “The USA stands with the people of Tennessee 100%, whatever they need!”
National Weather Service survey teams indicated that the damage in Nashville and Wilson County to the east was inflicted by a tornado of at least EF-3 intensity, with wind speeds up to 165 mph (266 kmh). One twister wrecked homes and businesses across a 10-mile (16 kilometer) stretch of Nashville, including parts of downtown.
The tornado that struck Putnam County damaged more than 100 structures along a 2-mile (3.2-kilometer) path. wiping some homes from their foundations and scattering debris. The garage Dyer's father used as an auto mechanic was scraped off its concrete slab, with metal rafters falling on his red Mustang with an Elvis Presley license plate.
Terry Cooler, an elder at the Double Springs Church of Christ, found only a hole in his roof, which he thinks was caused by flying debris. Much worse was the fate of the mother of a deacon at his church, who lost her home in the storm and then was rushed to a hospital for angioplasty and a stent.
“I'm sure the stress didn't help her,” Cooler said. “She's 86 and lost everything.”
Dyer and his neighbors spent the hours afterward picking through shattered glass, busted walls and drenched belongings for anything to salvage.
After surveying the damage Tuesday, Tennessee's governor marveled at people's resilience.
“In the worst of circumstances, the best of people comes out, and that's what we're seeing," Lee said.
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Associated Press contributors include Jonathan Mattise in Nashville and Kimberlee Kruesi, who traveled with the governor.