His Mercy and Love in this day
After the violent storms hit the south April 24 2010, there are witness to YHWH's Mercy.
Saviors as tornado hit: A table, a wall, a freezer
Apr 25, 7:08 PM (ET)
By HOLBROOK MOHR and JAY REEVES
YAZOO CITY, Miss. (AP) - One prayed to God under a communion table as his church was blown to pieces around him.
Another was on the phone with a meteorologist when the tornado threw him against a cinderblock wall that held just long enough to save his life. A coroner nearly became a victim himself when the twister flipped his truck four times; later he went out in his hospital gown to help identify bodies.
At least 10 people were killed when the tornado ripped through the rural Mississippi countryside, but the stories told by survivors on Sunday show how much higher the toll could have been.
Dale Thrasher, 60, had been alone in Hillcrest Baptist Church when the tornado hit Saturday, ripping away wood and metal until all that was left was rubble, Thrasher and the table he had climbed under as he prayed for protection.
"The whole building caved in," he said. "But me and that table were still there."
Sunday was sunny and breezy as Thrasher and other members of the Yazoo City church dug through the debris and pulled out a few chairs and other items. One found a hymnal opened to the song, "Till the Storm Passes By."
Hundreds of homes also were damaged in the storm, which carved a path of devastation from the Louisiana line to east-central Mississippi, and at least three dozen people were hurt. Rescuers spread out Sunday to find anyone who might be trapped, while survivors returned to demolished homes to salvage what they could and bulldoze the rubble.
"This tornado was enormous," said Gov. Haley Barbour, who grew up in Yazoo County, a county of about 28,000 people known for blues, catfish and cotton. The twister wreaked "utter obliteration" among the picturesque hills rising from the flat Mississippi Delta, the governor said.
Tornadoes also were reported in Louisiana, Arkansas and Alabama. The storm system tracked northeastward, downing trees in northwest Georgia early Sunday before moving offshore.
Mississippi's Choctaw County suffered the most confirmed deaths: five, including a baby and two other children. On Sunday the air there was filled with the buzz of chain saws, the rumbling of tractors and the scent of splintered pine trees.
Utility workers in cherry-pickers hovered over police officers directing traffic on a two-lane highway busy with relief workers and volunteers arriving to help.
All that remained of Sullivan's Crossroads Grocery was a pile of cinderblocks and some jars of pickled eggs and pigs' feet. But owner Ron Sullivan, his wife and four other people rode out the storm there and suffered only some cuts and bruises.
Sullivan had been on the phone, describing the weather conditions to a meteorologist, when the line went dead and the twister hit, tearing the wooden roof off the store and hurling Sullivan into a cinderblock wall.
"I was levitated and flew 15 feet over there to the back wall," he said. "The only reason I wasn't killed was the wall was still there. After I hit it, it collapsed."
A steel fuel storage tank, about 10 feet long, was uprooted by the twister and rolled into the store, coming to rest against a freezer. Hiding on the other side of the freezer was Sullivan's wife.
Across the street, the home of the parents of Houston Astros pitcher Roy Oswalt was reduced to rubble by the tornado. Oswalt himself was driving a bucket loader Sunday, trying to knock down a damaged tree on the property.
His father, Billy, had been out hunting when the storm hit, and his mother, Jean, hunkered down in a back room of the house with the family's dog.
"She got our little dog and covered up and she's OK," Billy Oswalt said.
The tornado went on to cut about a 10-mile path through Choctaw County, hacking off the tops of pine trees about eight feet above the ground before slamming into three mobile homes.
Alphonzo Evans, 38, had been sleeping in one of the homes when he heard the wind come up. He had planned to take cover in a hole outside, but it was too late. He shut the door.
"By the time I turned around, the wind came up and I went flying," Evans said.
The trailer flipped twice and broke apart, and Evans woke up on the ground beneath a fallen pine tree, wedged between his television and stove, he said.
Evans was sifting through what was left of his home Sunday. Most of the house had been blown into the woods, only the blocks it stood on remaining.
To the southwest in Yazoo County, Coroner Ricky Shivers was in his truck when the winds flipped the vehicle. He went to a hospital to have bruised ribs and cuts treated, then went out to help identify bodies in his hospital gown.
Shivers told the AP by phone Sunday morning that he did not know whether any more people had died because he was back in the hospital for more treatment. At least four people were killed in Yazoo County, and one died in neighboring Holmes County.
Gov. Barbour estimated at least 100 houses in Yazoo County alone had severe damage but said his estimate could rise later. Mississippi Emergency Management Agency spokesman Greg Flynn said Sunday that at least three dozen people were hurt and nearly 200 homes damaged in Attala, Holmes, Monroe and Warren Counties. Officials were still working to assess the total damage in Choctaw and Yazoo counties.
Speaking in the parking lot of a heavily damaged restaurant in Yazoo City, Barbour said emergency crews would be going to isolated houses in rural areas they had been unable to reach in the chaotic hours after Saturday's storm.
Hundreds were without electricity while others were left homeless, sifting through what little remained of their homes and bulldozing the rest. Volunteers poured into the hardest-hit areas with four-wheelers, chain saws and heavy equipment to chop up downed trees and haul away the wreckage as the cleanup began.
About 40 National Guard soldiers patrolled Yazoo City, some in Humvees and others in a Blackhawk helicopter. Dozens of state troopers and other law enforcement officers also came from far-flung parts of the state to help.
National Weather Service meteorologist Marc McAlister said the tornado had winds of 160 miles an hour and left a path of destruction at least 50 miles long. Crews will check the path to the southwest to Tallulah, La., just across the state line with Mississippi, as well as farther northeast of Yazoo County to see exactly how far the tornado traveled on the ground.
At Thrasher's devastated church, about three dozen members stood in a circle and sang "Till the Storm Passes By" on Sunday. Some held Bibles, some held babies and some held each other.
Thrasher has been helping to hold the church together since the recent death of its pastor, and he reminded the group that the church has survived tough times before. They rebuilt after their building was destroyed by arson about 10 years ago.
"The Lord brought us through the fire, and brought us back bigger and better," Thrasher said. "The Lord will bring us back bigger and better this time, if we stick together."
http://news.myway.com/index/id/home.html
Saviors as tornado hit: A table, a wall, a freezer
Apr 25, 7:08 PM (ET)
By HOLBROOK MOHR and JAY REEVES
YAZOO CITY, Miss. (AP) - One prayed to God under a communion table as his church was blown to pieces around him.
Another was on the phone with a meteorologist when the tornado threw him against a cinderblock wall that held just long enough to save his life. A coroner nearly became a victim himself when the twister flipped his truck four times; later he went out in his hospital gown to help identify bodies.
At least 10 people were killed when the tornado ripped through the rural Mississippi countryside, but the stories told by survivors on Sunday show how much higher the toll could have been.
Dale Thrasher, 60, had been alone in Hillcrest Baptist Church when the tornado hit Saturday, ripping away wood and metal until all that was left was rubble, Thrasher and the table he had climbed under as he prayed for protection.
"The whole building caved in," he said. "But me and that table were still there."
Sunday was sunny and breezy as Thrasher and other members of the Yazoo City church dug through the debris and pulled out a few chairs and other items. One found a hymnal opened to the song, "Till the Storm Passes By."
Hundreds of homes also were damaged in the storm, which carved a path of devastation from the Louisiana line to east-central Mississippi, and at least three dozen people were hurt. Rescuers spread out Sunday to find anyone who might be trapped, while survivors returned to demolished homes to salvage what they could and bulldoze the rubble.
"This tornado was enormous," said Gov. Haley Barbour, who grew up in Yazoo County, a county of about 28,000 people known for blues, catfish and cotton. The twister wreaked "utter obliteration" among the picturesque hills rising from the flat Mississippi Delta, the governor said.
Tornadoes also were reported in Louisiana, Arkansas and Alabama. The storm system tracked northeastward, downing trees in northwest Georgia early Sunday before moving offshore.
Mississippi's Choctaw County suffered the most confirmed deaths: five, including a baby and two other children. On Sunday the air there was filled with the buzz of chain saws, the rumbling of tractors and the scent of splintered pine trees.
Utility workers in cherry-pickers hovered over police officers directing traffic on a two-lane highway busy with relief workers and volunteers arriving to help.
All that remained of Sullivan's Crossroads Grocery was a pile of cinderblocks and some jars of pickled eggs and pigs' feet. But owner Ron Sullivan, his wife and four other people rode out the storm there and suffered only some cuts and bruises.
Sullivan had been on the phone, describing the weather conditions to a meteorologist, when the line went dead and the twister hit, tearing the wooden roof off the store and hurling Sullivan into a cinderblock wall.
"I was levitated and flew 15 feet over there to the back wall," he said. "The only reason I wasn't killed was the wall was still there. After I hit it, it collapsed."
A steel fuel storage tank, about 10 feet long, was uprooted by the twister and rolled into the store, coming to rest against a freezer. Hiding on the other side of the freezer was Sullivan's wife.
Across the street, the home of the parents of Houston Astros pitcher Roy Oswalt was reduced to rubble by the tornado. Oswalt himself was driving a bucket loader Sunday, trying to knock down a damaged tree on the property.
His father, Billy, had been out hunting when the storm hit, and his mother, Jean, hunkered down in a back room of the house with the family's dog.
"She got our little dog and covered up and she's OK," Billy Oswalt said.
The tornado went on to cut about a 10-mile path through Choctaw County, hacking off the tops of pine trees about eight feet above the ground before slamming into three mobile homes.
Alphonzo Evans, 38, had been sleeping in one of the homes when he heard the wind come up. He had planned to take cover in a hole outside, but it was too late. He shut the door.
"By the time I turned around, the wind came up and I went flying," Evans said.
The trailer flipped twice and broke apart, and Evans woke up on the ground beneath a fallen pine tree, wedged between his television and stove, he said.
Evans was sifting through what was left of his home Sunday. Most of the house had been blown into the woods, only the blocks it stood on remaining.
To the southwest in Yazoo County, Coroner Ricky Shivers was in his truck when the winds flipped the vehicle. He went to a hospital to have bruised ribs and cuts treated, then went out to help identify bodies in his hospital gown.
Shivers told the AP by phone Sunday morning that he did not know whether any more people had died because he was back in the hospital for more treatment. At least four people were killed in Yazoo County, and one died in neighboring Holmes County.
Gov. Barbour estimated at least 100 houses in Yazoo County alone had severe damage but said his estimate could rise later. Mississippi Emergency Management Agency spokesman Greg Flynn said Sunday that at least three dozen people were hurt and nearly 200 homes damaged in Attala, Holmes, Monroe and Warren Counties. Officials were still working to assess the total damage in Choctaw and Yazoo counties.
Speaking in the parking lot of a heavily damaged restaurant in Yazoo City, Barbour said emergency crews would be going to isolated houses in rural areas they had been unable to reach in the chaotic hours after Saturday's storm.
Hundreds were without electricity while others were left homeless, sifting through what little remained of their homes and bulldozing the rest. Volunteers poured into the hardest-hit areas with four-wheelers, chain saws and heavy equipment to chop up downed trees and haul away the wreckage as the cleanup began.
About 40 National Guard soldiers patrolled Yazoo City, some in Humvees and others in a Blackhawk helicopter. Dozens of state troopers and other law enforcement officers also came from far-flung parts of the state to help.
National Weather Service meteorologist Marc McAlister said the tornado had winds of 160 miles an hour and left a path of destruction at least 50 miles long. Crews will check the path to the southwest to Tallulah, La., just across the state line with Mississippi, as well as farther northeast of Yazoo County to see exactly how far the tornado traveled on the ground.
At Thrasher's devastated church, about three dozen members stood in a circle and sang "Till the Storm Passes By" on Sunday. Some held Bibles, some held babies and some held each other.
Thrasher has been helping to hold the church together since the recent death of its pastor, and he reminded the group that the church has survived tough times before. They rebuilt after their building was destroyed by arson about 10 years ago.
"The Lord brought us through the fire, and brought us back bigger and better," Thrasher said. "The Lord will bring us back bigger and better this time, if we stick together."
http://news.myway.com/index/id/home.html
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FounderPermalink Reply by Cyprium on -
"Sunday was sunny and breezy as Thrasher and other members of the Yazoo City church dug through the debris and pulled out a few chairs and other items. One found a hymnal opened to the song, "Till the Storm Passes By.""
Really awesome...in case anyone out there had any doubts that His hand is over all His people..and there is nothing He can't deliver us from...He just left a little reminder.
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Permalink Reply by Kathy on
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Isaiah 32:2 And a man shall be as an hiding place from the wind, and a covert from the tempest; as rivers of water in a dry place, as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land.
Bible found among Oklahoma tornado debris, opened to Isaiah 32The Bible, which belonged to Michael Alexander and his fiancé Sheila Spurlin, was found in nearby debris by a storm chaser named Brandon Heiden. He watched helplessly as the storm tore Lance Carter's home apart, then made sure the family was okay after it was all over. Heiden was the first one to notice the Bible and took a picture of it to help it find its way back home.
Gage Ross, a Carter family friend, stopped by to help begin cleaning up; he spotted the same Bible, which was open to a telling verse in Isaiah 32: "A man will be as a hiding place from the wind, and a cover from the tempest."
"The Lord must be with us, I guess," Ross told KFOR News.
Alexander and Spurlin lived in a trailer behind Carter's property but stayed safe during the storm at a local shelter. Unfortunately, their home did not survive the storm, which leveled an entire town and killed at least 51 people, including several children.
"I got here after it passed, and I just fell to my knees," Alexander said. "It's all I could do. Everything that I owned, everything we owned was in the trailer."
However, the Bible somehow managed to survive the storm, and Alexander is incredibly grateful to have it back in his possession.
Many across the nation see the Bible's recovery, and the particular passage it was opened to, as hope in the midst of the storm.
"Bible found after tornado actually opened to that scripture. Literal hope in a storm. So beautiful I could cry," tweeted Breeanne Howe.
"Real as it gets," added JuhBray. "This Bible was found in tornado debris. Opened to Isaiah 32:2."
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The riddle of the 'angel priest': Holy man appeared from nowhere to pray with trapped girl and rescuers in traffic accident
Pinned inside her mangled Mercedes, seriously injured and fading fast, Katie Lentz turned to her rescuers on the lonely open stretch of Missouri highway and asked them to pray.
Struck head-on by a drunk driver on Sunday morning, emergency workers had been battling for an hour and a half to free Lentz, but to no avail.
But as they joined hands a Catholic priest appeared, even though there were no bystanders and the road was blocked, who offered a prayer and an instruction to the rescuers that they would now be able to free her.
Suddenly, heavy equipment needed to cut through the metal arrived from a nearby town and Lentz was pulled from the wreck in time to be saved - but when they turned to thank the priest, he was gone.
'He came up and approached the patient, and offered a prayer,' Chief Raymond Reed told KHQA-TV.
'It was a Catholic priest who had anointing oil with him. A sense of calmness came over her, and it did us as well.
'I can’t be for certain how it was said, but myself and another firefighter, we very plainly heard that we should remain calm, that our tools would now work and that we would get her out of that vehicle.'
That is when officers from the neighboring Hannibal Fire Department arrived with their jaws-of-life and Lentz was pulled to safety and put into an air ambulance to hospital.
Turning to thank the guardian angel who had arrived from nowhere at their lowest ebb, the emergency crews could not find him.
The highway had been blocked for a quarter of a mile each end during the hour and a half rescue and no bystanders and parked cars were anywhere near the crash site on Highway 19 near Center.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2386627/The-riddle-angel-pr...
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