Twister Ravages Home Near Akron
May 29, 2019 at 12:05 a.m.
By Amanda Bridgman-
"I was sitting on the couch, eating, in my pajamas, the dogs were with me, watching the news and radar, and then I see it coming right through the woods," Hunt said. "By the time I got to the basement entrance door, the front door swung open."
With his wife not home, and his dogs already down the stairs, Hunt grabbed the furnace, struggling to fight the winds lifting him up.
"At that point I was scared," he said. "I thought to myself, OK, am I gonna be able to hang on?"
By the time it was over – in what he estimates as less than a minute of extreme commotion then sudden calm – Hunt climbed the steps and found himself standing outside.
Feelings of shock and then heartbreak overcame him.
"We just bought it and I fixed it all up," he said of the house he and his wife Alyssa purchased two years ago. That property is located in northern Miami County on CR 1500 North and sustained the most damage from Monday night's storms.
The storm left quite a scene: vehicles overturned like Matchbox cars, trees uprooted by the rows, metal building material wrapped around still-standing treetops like licorice, an open refrigerator still upright with a carton of eggs safely sitting on the shelf.
By Tuesday morning, the Hunts' property was bustling with activity. Neighbors of all ages were helping, some with heavy equipment, to move the wreckage, others with gloves and boots on to help sort through what's left of the family's personal items; TV station camera crews lining the driveway, and BJ Hunt stood as media waited in line to talk to him one by one.
He recounted after the storm realizing he was in his pajamas and the nearly impossible time he had trying to find a pair of regular pants and boots to put on. When he did, "I don't even know if they were my pants," he joked.
Hunt said he and his wife plan to rebuild. In the meantime, they'll live in their yard in a family member's RV. A GoFundMe page was started by Alyssa Hunt's sister and had reached its $5,000 goal within 17 hours.
No one was hurt in the storms that ravaged northern Miami County Monday night. For that, BJ Hunt is thankful. But the sigh heard from him as he walked through his flattened house made it clear that no one knows what it's like to lose everything you own overnight, until you do.
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"I was sitting on the couch, eating, in my pajamas, the dogs were with me, watching the news and radar, and then I see it coming right through the woods," Hunt said. "By the time I got to the basement entrance door, the front door swung open."
With his wife not home, and his dogs already down the stairs, Hunt grabbed the furnace, struggling to fight the winds lifting him up.
"At that point I was scared," he said. "I thought to myself, OK, am I gonna be able to hang on?"
By the time it was over – in what he estimates as less than a minute of extreme commotion then sudden calm – Hunt climbed the steps and found himself standing outside.
Feelings of shock and then heartbreak overcame him.
"We just bought it and I fixed it all up," he said of the house he and his wife Alyssa purchased two years ago. That property is located in northern Miami County on CR 1500 North and sustained the most damage from Monday night's storms.
The storm left quite a scene: vehicles overturned like Matchbox cars, trees uprooted by the rows, metal building material wrapped around still-standing treetops like licorice, an open refrigerator still upright with a carton of eggs safely sitting on the shelf.
By Tuesday morning, the Hunts' property was bustling with activity. Neighbors of all ages were helping, some with heavy equipment, to move the wreckage, others with gloves and boots on to help sort through what's left of the family's personal items; TV station camera crews lining the driveway, and BJ Hunt stood as media waited in line to talk to him one by one.
He recounted after the storm realizing he was in his pajamas and the nearly impossible time he had trying to find a pair of regular pants and boots to put on. When he did, "I don't even know if they were my pants," he joked.
Hunt said he and his wife plan to rebuild. In the meantime, they'll live in their yard in a family member's RV. A GoFundMe page was started by Alyssa Hunt's sister and had reached its $5,000 goal within 17 hours.
No one was hurt in the storms that ravaged northern Miami County Monday night. For that, BJ Hunt is thankful. But the sigh heard from him as he walked through his flattened house made it clear that no one knows what it's like to lose everything you own overnight, until you do.
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