…in Eastern Nebraska and Western Iowa. Looks like one squarely hit Elkhorn NE. Stood on the deck and watched it…big damn wedge tornado. Warning sirens have been been sounding for over two hours. The system is now in Iowa between Mo Valley and Neola. The channel 6 news had a camera at the airport and the tornado took the camera out while they were on the air showing the tornado hitting the airport.
That storm was a massive slow moving sucker when it rolled through last night and this morning. 3” rain and high winds. Got a bunch of stuff to clean up.
Probably the most concerning damage happened at Garner Industries just outside of Lincoln near Waverly. The tornado derailed a train across the road from Garner Industries.
LINCOLN, Neb. (KOLN) - A northeast Lancaster County business was hit by a tornado Friday afternoon with 70 workers inside.
According to Lancaster County Chief Deputy Ben Houchin, a tornado hit Garner Industries near N 98th Street and Cornhusker Highway between Lincoln and Waverly around 3 p.m.
Houchin said the building collapsed with several people trapped inside.
Three people were injured and taken to area hospitals with but are expected to be okay. The other workers were taken to the Sandhills Global Event Center.
According to Bryan Health, the Bryan Trauma Center at Bryan West Campus treated two patients who sustained injuries from tornadoes that touched down in Lancaster County. Both patients are currently in triage.
Part of Highway 6 near 98th Street is still closed. LSO asks drivers to stay away from the facility.
According to its website, Garner Industries is a plastic injection molding service.
According to BNSF, that same tornado struck a train between Waverly and Lincoln around 3:25 p.m., causing multiple cars to derail. There were no injuries to the crew and no hazmat was released. BNSF personnel are on site working to clear the incident as safely as possible.
Our camper is in Adams, Ne. getting warranty roof repair. Adams is almost due south of Lincoln……the tornadoes passed over/near Adams……I hope that we have a camper to bring back home! memtb
Looks like the Elkhorn tornado will be one of the top 20 strongest tornados ever . Over 230 mph gate to gate wind speed. First EF - 5 tornado in 11 years.
It's that time of year in that part of the country. It's one thing I don't miss living in Kansas a few F 4-5 came close to Wichita when I was living there.
Hate those things! I grew up in Stillwater, OK and sometime in the mid 60s there were 103 tornados that touched down statewide in one 24 hour period. I was only worried about the one that hit Stillwater.
If you were not Christian and had no knowledge of the scientific explanation of tornados, how could you doubt that angry gods existed after witnessing that.
Prayers for all in the path of all those tornados. Lived up in NE for 50 years and saw my share of tornados and the damage left in their wake. They can and will do significant damage, even if just an EF-1, but a 4 or 5 is truly disastrous as well as potentially fatal (Joplin, MO and Moore, OK come to mind).
Tornados all up and down the I-35 corridor but nothing like what hit Nebraska and western Iowa. Some damage in central Iowa but Minden Iowa just east of Council Bluffs got ransacked. I'm sure by tomorrow morning we will have more reports.
Grew up in Omaha. Spent my share of time in the basement! Never saw anything like those vids. One went thru Omaha when I was a kid. At night. Never saw it. Condolences to all who lost anything!
I hope that the crew in that vehicle had someone watching for feeder tornadoes. A system that can generate an F5 can easily spin off a F1-F2 feeder and that can easily destroy an SUV full of inattentive young people.
I hope that the crew in that vehicle had someone watching for feeder tornadoes. A system that can generate an F5 can easily spin off a F1-F2 feeder and that can easily destroy an SUV full of inattentive young people.
Not only that but close enough to get a 2x4 through the window.
Just found out that some friends of ours lost their house last night. They have/had a beautiful place on the top of a hill south of town closer to Blair. I thought we might be able to help with cleaning up the mess but our minister(who is helping organize the cleanup) said that will have to come next week. Right now everyone in our area is just clearing branches and junk in our neighborhood.
I hope that the crew in that vehicle had someone watching for feeder tornadoes. A system that can generate an F5 can easily spin off a F1-F2 feeder and that can easily destroy an SUV full of inattentive young people.
Not only that but close enough to get a 2x4 through the window.
I was texting with a friend who lives just outside of St. Charles when all of that was going on. Yep, she was worried. New house on 10 acres. There was another tornado spotted by New Virginia so she was in between them.
Missed us by a couple of miles. We had zero damage and the only evidence that any storm has passed through was that the canvas cover of the grill on the deck got picked up and and dropped in the yard. We definitely dodged a bullet by The Grace of GOD.
One of my wife's friends had some roof damage and her kids' trampoline was sucked up out of their yard near 192nd and West Maple and dropped around 4 miles away near168th and State.
Eppley Airfield on the Missouri River, about 17 miles east of Elkhorn, had a different tornado wrecked 4 hangers and damaged 32 private planes, including some jets and a Yak fighter Lucky that the tornado didn't come through next weekend when the Berkshire-Hathaway annual meeting is scheduled and there are dozen of out of town aircraft parked there.
My cousin lives about a mile south of the Ford dealership in Blair. I texted him yesterday checking to see if he and other family members were O.K. (we have a bunch of them in that area of Nebraska). He said all was well with everybody but he had friends that got hit pretty hard about 3 miles south of his place and he was going down there to see how he could help. Could be the same folks you know???
Really glad to hear that your folks got by okay! Sounds like the south tip of Blair did get hit.
Very well could be the same folks or their neighbors. Our friends live on an acreage that was 40 acres but has been subdivided into 3 acreages. All 3 of the houses were pretty well totaled. They were each a $500K to $1M+ homes. There are a lot of houses that have been built in between Omaha and Blair - and none of them are cheap!
The Weather Service is saying that the Elkhorn tornado was an F3. That may be, but of the 8-10 tornadoes I have seen, it was bigger than all the others combined. It was a half mile wide. I couldn’t make myself believe that I was looking at a tornado…but…there was no other explanation. It was just a HUGE black cloud moving, on the ground, through the city. Watching the electrical transformers exploding was bizarre.
I was sitting on the front porch of my aunt and uncles farm outside Rising and watched this from formation to finish, damn cool. One of the most famous in Nebraska.
The tornado touched down near Hastings and traveled 70 miles (110 km) as it passed through or near Harvard, Giltner, Hampton, Bradshaw, Benedict, Strongsburg, Shelby, and Rising City before it finally lifted near Bellwood. The United States Weather Bureau documented that every structure in the path of the tornado was completely destroyed.[1] A farm three miles (4.8 km) northwest of Bradshaw was obliterated at F5 intensity, and two people were killed.[3] Fifteen people were injured in Shelby, which was barely spared from a direct strike.[3]
Otter, The news is reporting that there were 250 homes destroyed in Washington County, most were in rural areas. Apparently tornadoes have changed their target of choice from trailer parks to rural subdivisions.
This is going to make homeowners insurance skyrocket around here. We are already paying $400 a month and that is with a $5,000 all perils deductible.
Otter, The news is reporting that there were 250 homes destroyed in Washington County, most were in rural areas. Apparently tornadoes have changed their target of choice from trailer parks to rural subdivisions.
This is going to make homeowners insurance skyrocket around here. We are already paying $400 a month and that is with a $5,000 all perils deductible.
Jeebus man you aint lived in nebraska long, yall got fugging lucky. Targets of choice ? LMAO
The tornadoes in Grand Island, Nebraska killed five, injured 200, and caused an estimated more than $285 million (USD) ($1.02 billion 2022 USD) in damage.
Damage estimates ranged from $250 million to $500 million. The number of homes destroyed was 287 with damage to 1400 others. The time of day aided in the warning process as a spotter saw the tornado in Sarpy County during the daylight hours and children were no longer in school. The NWS aided by REACT and Civil Defense systems provided good lead time for the residents of Douglas County. Three people did perish. An elderly woman died in her home and likely did not hear the warnings. A waitress was killed in a restaurant as she huddled with others in the restroom. A man was killed while seeking shelter at a gas station.