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Storm cuts huge swath through the area
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CROWLEY -- Larry Turner and his wife, Margie, surveyed the pile of debris that once was their home.
The roof was completely caved in. Some trees were shredded and destroyed. Other trees were unscathed, except for pink insulation in their branches.A chandelier gently swayed in the wind."We were lucky," Larry Turner said.The Turners' home was one of at least three in Crowley destroyed in Wednesday night's severe storm. In all, 20 homes in Crowley were damaged, officials said."We're probably going to rebuild, if it can be rebuilt," Larry Turner said. "I guess anything can be rebuilt."His wife leaned into him and said one thing was certain, "We're going to be together."The Turners' house on Sharondale Drive, south of FM 1187 and east of West Cleburne Road, was one of three houses where the roofs were completely blown away, one right after the other.The metal siding from a workshop was moved from the back to the front of the Turners' house. The car was extruding from the garage with the roof caved in on it.Margie Turner said she and her husband were "watching American Idol just like the rest of the world," when the storm hit.She was wearing a helmet Thursday morning lent to her by a firefighter for protection as she prepared with her husband to enter their home of five years to retrieve items.Turner said that there was no warning on television and that no sirens were heard Wednesday night."Our kitchen ceiling blew through. We tried to go out through the middle of the house, through the dining room," she said. "My husband just got on top of me and we just waited" for the storm to end.The couple went into a bedroom with their dogs and waited a while longer to make sure they were safe, she said.The Turners' hot tub was upside down in a neighbor's yard."If that wasn't a tornado, I don't know what was," Margie Turner said.Another Crowley resident, Mike Keith, described the storm as intense and loud when it hit at about 8:30 p.m..Keith called it "a huge rain event followed by winds, 80-90-100 mph, with that typical freight train sound from a roar.""We found the smallest, most sturdy room in the house and we got in the closet," said Keith, who has lived on Morfeld Drive in Crowley since 1989."It was like standing under a railroad trestle. There was the drumming, the roaring and the shaking of the house," Keith said. "All the windows rattled and I thought they were going to blow ... and it was over in 30 seconds."The doors of a large metal building in which Keith stores his recreational vehicle were ripped off and wadded nearby.Nobody was seriously injured in Crowley, said Randy Renois, Tarrant County fire marshal, but some residents received minor cuts and scrapes.Renois said the affected area is about three city blocks in size and that the debris field extends a half mile or more to the south.Lots of soggy pink insulation and pieces of roof shingles were littered everywhere in the neighborhood.Oncor Electric Delivery is on scene in Crowley trying to restore power to the affected area.
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