2012 Weathering the Storm

Sometimes covering a story is more than just covering a story I have been a writer for as long as I can remember.

Instead of being scared, I remember people mostly being When I was really young, the misspelled annoyed that they were having to sit downstairs STORY BY poems were presents for my mother or someKELLIE SINGLETON when there was work to be done. Everyone knew thing to show my father when he came home a tornado wasn’t going to come through Franklin from work. As I started school, the one-page County so why bother with the routine of taking stories were ways to express my creativity and shelter? get all the silliness eight- and nine-year-olds experience out of I finally made it up to the office and attempted to get some my system. As I moved into my teenage years, the words written work done but the reports of severe weather, especially for the in my journals or jotted on notebook paper became more than afternoon, started to pick up. School officials made the call to just creativity, and as the years progressed, my writings morphed dismiss students and faculty for the day, which nixed my interinto a tangible thing – a friend, of sorts. Writing became the view at Phil Campbell High School. At first I thought the decision shoulder I could cry on, yell at and laugh with when all of life’s to let out school was a tad-bit hasty, but as the day wore on, the ups and downs came my way. predictions for nasty storms in the afternoon kept getting more The act of writing became a way to pour myself out into words and more persistent. so I could express my own personal thoughts about things that Jonathan made the call to send us all home considering there have happened to me, things I’ve struggled with, things I’ve were a few employees who lived a good ways away and one that rejoiced over and things I’ve had to deal with that I couldn’t real- needed to be with her child who had been let out from school. ly describe to anyone else in a way that would have made sense.

I stayed around for a while longer since I live in town so I could When I went to college, it seemed like a natural choice to study take advantage of the quiet newsroom and get a few things writing. It was what I was good at. It was what I knew. But in my done. Somewhere around 3:30 p.m. I made the call to go ahead studies I came to realize there are many different forms of writ- and call it a day because another storm was moving into the area. ing, and not all forms of writing allow you to freely express yourThe wind was really picking up as I made the drive home. Rain self the way I’m used to. Journalism is one of such forms. pelted my windshield and there was an eerie quality in the air As a journalist, the main thing I have to remember when cov- that is still hard to describe, even to this day. Once I made it ering an event or writing an article is that I am supposed to be inside the house, I went to my dining room window to watch the an impartial observer – someone who takes her own opinions, wind swirling the rain around in the air. whatever they may be, and sets them aside so I can give as fair It was at that moment that I heard a loud cracking noise that an account as possible about what’s going on and allow my read- sounded like the breaking of Mother Nature’s bones. I saw moveers to form their own opinions based on the simple facts I would ment out of the corner of my eye and witnessed the 200-year-old provide. oak tree in our front yard – and 30 feet from where I was standing As you can imagine, this isn’t easy for me, especially working at the window – split and crash to the ground. in a place where I know many of the people, places and things Once the shock from watching the tree split and fall passed and I write about because this is my hometown – where I was born the relief from the fact that the Lord allowed the enormous tree and raised. to fall away from our house and not land directly on top of me Even though it is a struggle at times, at the end of the day I can faded away, I remember that I started to scream. No one else was almost always put my thoughts and opinions on the back burner at home so no one could hear me. It wasn’t a planned reaction; it and focus on doing my job to the best of my ability. just came out of my mouth.

But April 27, 2011, was an entirely different story.

I grabbed my cell phone and tried to call my husband at work.

On that Wednesday, we were all at the Times office. I had a fairly The cell phone service was terrible because of the rain and full slate of things planned for that day, including an interview at wind and I couldn’t get a call to go through. By the time I finally Phil Campbell High School at 11 a.m. reached David, I was in a panic and worried the tree falling was We had been getting reports that severe weather was predicted a sign that a tornado was close by. In my mind, I couldn’t comfor that day, but in Alabama that usually means some strong prehend what else would have the strength to knock over a tree winds, some pea-size hail and maybe a power outage. I was more that big (even though I would later discover the tree was rotten concerned about having to get out in the pouring rain than I was on the inside and the tons of rain soaked into the ground along about tornados because, let’s face it, that never happens here, with the strong winds all day had been enough to do the trick). right?

David made it home in about five minutes and by that point, I had to go by the courthouse that morning and I can remember it was barely sprinkling rain. We stood outside and wondered how black the sky looked. In fact, it was so dark and ominous what in the world we were going to do about this massive tree that I actually snapped a picture of the blackened sky as I walked uprooted in our yard and blocking the road. I cried as I realized inside the doors just because the sky doesn’t normally look that how close it came to smashing our house with me inside. People way, even when it’s stormy. kept stopping to see if we were okay.

While I was inside the district attorney’s office, the first torThen my phone rang. nado warning siren of the daylight hours went off. We all herded I looked down and saw my boss, Jonathan Willis, was calling down to the basement of the courthouse where we proceeded me. I figured he had heard about the tree falling just like 20 other to spend the next 30 minutes until we were given the all clear. people who had tried calling me in the past 45 minutes.

WEATHERING

THE STORM

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I answered the phone and he asked me what I was doing. I told him what had happened and expected a shocked reply. Instead I heard five words that wouldn’t even register in my brain.

“Kellie, Phil Campbell is gone.”

Phil Campbell is gone? Gone where? Why? How? When? What do you mean? WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? Jonathan tried explaining to me that shortly after I left the office, a massive tornado ripped through Phil Campbell. He got word about what happened right away and headed out there himself to see how bad it really was.

And it was bad.

I asked him if he needed me out there and he said I if I could get out there that people just needed help. There were people dying and bleeding and lost and scared.

I forgot about the tree, which now seemed ridiculous in comparison, and jumped in the car with David. I started running through a list of people in my head that I knew from Phil Campbell. The sweet high school counselor that I talked to on a regular basis, the elementary school principal who was always so nice to me, the police chief, a few residents, some of the students I had interviewed for stories. Were they okay? Had they found shelter?

David and I weren’t the only ones trying to get into Phil Campbell. By that point, word had spread about what had happened and there was a line of traffic backed up to where the highway turns from a four-lane into a two-lane.

I desperately wanted to get into the town and find out what was going on, but after waiting for an hour and only moving about half a mile, we finally gave up and went home to wait on news from Jonathan. Even though I was worried about the people I had met during my time as a reporter, I didn’t know anyone personally in the town of Phil Campbell, so I felt a small sense of relief that none of my friends or family could have possibly been involved.

We had been home for about an hour when I heard a knock at my door and I opened it to find one of my best friends standing there. I assumed Channing had driven by and saw the massive tree across the road and stopped to see what was going on.

But I was wrong.

“Have you heard?”

As with Jonathan’s call earlier that day, a dozen questions flashed through my head: Have I heard what? I’ve heard a lot of things today. Have I heard about the tornado? Have I heard

about the school? Have I heard a lot of people have been killed?

“Have I heard what?” I asked.

She paused before she uttered the two words that made my world stop moving, made my brain shut down and stop functioning.

“Kelli’s gone.”

Kelli. My best friend from high school, middle school and elementary school. The one I had done everything with from the time I was probably eight years old. The one I spent countless, and I mean countless, hours on the phone with, spending the night with, getting advice from, giving advice to, counting on, leaning on, depending on. Kelli Thorn Morgan.

I remember staring at Channing for a long time, waiting for her to say it was a joke – to say she was lying. But her face never changed from the somber state it had been in since she walked through my door.

“Why? Where? How? WHY?” Channing began telling me that all she knew at that point was that Kelli and her husband, Mike, had been trying to get to his grandfather’s house when the tornado came through East Franklin where they lived. Their nearly two-year-old son, Dylan, had been with Kelli’s parents a few miles away and was okay, but Kelli and Mike didn’t make it.

East Franklin. I hadn’t even realized at this point that the tornado had gone though there, so I wasn’t thinking about Kelli being in the tornado’s path.

My head was reeling and I had to sit down. I noticed my cheeks were wet with tears but I didn’t remember starting to cry. It didn’t make sense at all. Tornados didn’t come through Alabama, especially not on top of the mountain and through all the hills of East Franklin. Tornados came through the plains of Kansas, the flatlands in Oklahoma. Not here. And they certainly didn’t kill people I knew and loved.

Channing and I cried together for some time before she finally left without us saying much else. What can you say? What can you do? I didn’t know. I didn’t have much experience with people close to me dying. The only person really close to me who had ever passed away was my grandfather and I was almost four at the time, so I couldn’t really use that experience as a frame of reference.

After Channing left, I just sat staring at the TV until David finally asked me if I was okay. I shook my head indicating that I wasn’t but I didn’t know what to do about it. Then the tears really start-

“Kelli. My best friend from high school, middle school and elementary school. The one I had done everything with from the time I was probably eight years old..........

“Why? Where? How? WHY?”

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WEATHERING

THE STORM