TUNICA COUNTY, Miss. — The potential for more severe weather in the Mid-South is unsettling news for people who are still recovering after tornadoes devastated their communities.
Tunica County residents are closely watching the skies after an EF-1 tornado damaged 45 homes.
Michael Whalen is thankful his family is alive after the tornado ripped though their mobile home. He remembers rushing to get home and fearing the worst for his wife and son.
“My wife called and said, ‘baby…it’s a tornado done hit the house.’ I said, ‘well, y’all ok?’ She said, ‘we okay, but we’re trying to get out.’ I said, ‘go to the back door’ and when I got here, it was just demolished,” he recalled.
His family was not injured, but the roof of their mobile home is gone, furniture is still water logged, and what Michael Whalen calls his “man cave” is in shambles.
In the area of east Tunica County, there are still plenty of reminders of last Friday’s tornado and first hand accounts. Joel Bond watched the twister head toward his mobile home.
“So I went inside the house, cause I have someone that live with me. I said, ‘Come on. We got to get out of here. We got to get out of here,'” Bond said.
Bond, his house mate, dog and goat escaped, but the mobile home wasn’t as lucky.
“It knocked a hole in my bedroom wall, blew out the kitchen window and ten or fifteen seconds it was over with,” he said.
With all eyes on the sky and a threat of more severe weather Wednesday, Michael Whalen counts his blessings and prays.
“For better luck on the other people cause they really don’t want to be in no tornado like this here. It was just a disaster,” Whalen said.
Tunica County EMA Director LeRon Weeks told WREG the EF-1 tornado is the same one that moved into Desoto County, causing damage in the Eudora community.
