A severe storm turned into a tornado this afternoon in Mercer County after leaving Jay County Indiana. Multiple homes, barns, and other structures were left with major damage. Our Adrienne Shelton was in Fort Recovery for the aftermath and heard from residents who experienced the storm firsthand.
“The neighbor to the west of us, their big barn went down," says Todd Fullenkamp. "To the east of us, he put a new building up two years ago, it’s totally gone, next place down the road is totally gone.”
Trees toppled over blocking driveways, telephone poles snapped in half across the roads, and debris scattered through the fields was just some of the noticeable damage from the tornado in Fort Recovery.
It was a sight for sore eyes, but everyone in the area that we spoke to was in good spirits and happy to be safe from the storm.
John Bihn found himself outside in the middle of the tornado. “We didn’t know if we wanted to go (out) or not, and when he tried opening the door we knew we were in a vacuum so then we decided to get out of the shop. When we come out of the shop, the tornado was above us and picking things up and throwing them all over the place.”
The Fullenkamp family, just around the corner, saw warnings on their phone about the tornado first. When they saw the sky for themselves, they knew it was time to take cover.
Fullenkamp says, “We looked outside and we could see off to the Northwest that the clouds looked like there was a little bit of rotation, so we grabbed the dog and went down to the basement to the saferoom. It got real noisy for about two minutes and all of a sudden it got quiet, so we waited for another five minutes and was like, ‘Well, let’s go see. It must be over,’ walked outside and seen all the damage.”
He says that the most important thing was that his house and the other buildings on his property were okay, with just minor damage to the barn roof. Neighbors and family members of those affected by the storm were quick to start helping clean the mess left behind.
The National Weather Service will be surveying the area for damage in the next coming days to determine the strength and severity of the tornado.
