The Tornado of Destruction!!!

I have to laugh at the enthusiasm for the project and then solemnly remember when I hear my son say, "The Tornado of Destruction!!!".


Here we are testing out our Tornado Simulator after we had tweaked it a bit to get a better vortex.  It is an upside down Tornado.  I am not sure how to make it form right side up.  Any suggestions?  We used dry ice and two fans attached to batteries.

Alabama has Tornadoes all year long but the season peaks in March/April and October/November. 

My son and I were in the activity center of this church having social skills lessons during this tornado.  The picture made the news.  It was taken by Ryan Crim.  It was before the April 27th Tornadoes and was taken in January of 2010.  We were not meeting as a robotics group then thankfully.  Come to think of it...most of the children that are in our robotics group were at the same social skills lesson.  I am glad that none of the kids saw how close it was.  What would happen if that spire was hit???

We do have to be careful when discussing Tornadoes.  Most of the kids in my group went through the April 27th Tornadoes, which were much much much worse.

It was hard to keep track of where they were popping up on the radar screen on TV because there were so many on that day.  Then in the evening all the power went out.  It was almost a week before it was restored.  I remember how hard it was to find out information afterwards.

Luckily at home I had prepared beforehand and had an emergency kit.  I had a Coleman oven, stove and fuel for pizzas.  My son is a selective eater, something that is common in the autism community.  There were few things he would eat and pizza is one of them.  I think that was my biggest worry.  What were we going to get him to eat.

There was a few things we hadn't thought of preparing beforehand like having enough gas in our car.  We did not go anywhere as a result.  We also did not have a generator or a grill even though I had made up for it by the Coleman stove.  A friend of ours was able to locate a generator for us a few days after.  I used all the food in the upright freezer to keep the fridge cold.  Most people took theirs out and had a large cookout.

One major problem we did have was we needed to keep yogurt cold. That was because it was the only way my son at the time would take any medicine.  We learned a lot during that time.  Every one here has a story.

Thankfully we all survived, but what we went through that day always comes to mind when the Tornado sirens go off.  Others in Alabama were not as fortunate as we were.  They will be forever in our hearts, minds and prayers.  We dedicate this post to them.