East Tennessee Tornado’s

Kingsport, Tennessee – I wrote this article from the basement of my Kingsport home as tornado alerts sounded from the television upstairs in my living room..
Tonight, hail hits the side of my home and wind whips the exterior.
The storm we are going through started out as rain, wind and quickly turned into a nightmare for residence of the Tri-Cities. News Channel 11 in Johnson City has been on the air all evening reporting tornado’s from Knoxville to Bristol with the Tri-Cities Airport in Blountville, Tennessee in the bulls eye.
My nine year old son sits across from me half asleep, holding a flash light and bottle of water. I pulled him and our three year old son from the bed and my wife and I carried them to the basement as alerts screamed from our television.
I could not help but think of the people of London in 1941 running to the shelters holding their children as the Germans dropped bombs from above.
Windshields are broken, trees are down and homes have been damaged and this night is not over yet.
My three year old son is sitting in my wife’s lap holding a small Spongebob doll and looking at the basement surrounding that he has never seen before. Our house is one hundred years old, I try to assure our kids and myself that this old house has seen many such storms and will be here tomorrow.
Morning has arrived, there has been fourteen confirmed deaths in our region. The Greene County area appears to be in a disaster area and homes are destroyed in numerous areas. Tornado’s touched down everywhere in the Tri-Cities and there is reports that homes were damaged in Gray and Meadowview areas. My family got through this, I just pray for those who lost so much in the most horrible tornado outbreak I have ever seen in my forty seven years as a Tri-Cities resident.