Oakfield Feels Greensburg's Pain
May 7, 2007
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FYI: The massive twister moved on a track of 1.7 miles wide and 22 miles long stretch. This F5 Enhanced tornado with estimated winds as high as 205 mph, was the most powerful twister to hit the US in eight years destroyed 95% of the town last Friday May 4, 2007. The death toll from this tornado that obliterated this farming village climbed to 10 Monday, they did have a 20 minuted notice.
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A Fond du Lac County community understands what people in a small Kansas town are going through. An extended F5 tornado -- the most powerful rating the National Weather Service can give a tornado -- flattened 95 percent of the town of Greensburg, a community of 1,500, killing ten.
This summer marks eleven years since an F5 tornado destroyed most of the town of Oakfield, and those affected are still coping with the storm's aftermath.
"You thank God you're alive and your family's alive," Dale Schmidt says.
People in Oakfield say they know what it's like to rebuild a community ripped apart.
"It wiped out the school out and the church, and now you don't have a school there," Schmidt says.
Schmidt remembers coming home to what was the main street of his town although nothing was intact.
"We had cans from the canning company here, we had cans and glass, you name it," he remembers.
"There were resources there set up for us, which helped us all, I think, in the long run -- the tetanus shot there, the things you needed on a day-to-day basis, the people came by with the sandwiches and helped us," Joan Ryan recalls.
One woman who lost her home to the tornado says her heart always goes out to tornado victims who lose everything and have to face what remains.
"It's a long, hard process, but in the end they will be all right," Ryan says. "I truly believe you have to have faith and that will bring them through it."
Others in Oakfield say it's hard to watch the weather on TV because any warning of bad weather reminds them of what they went through.
"Every time it gets cloudy, they're nervous, they're nervous as hell, because they're afraid it's going to come," Vernon Riese says.
"My brother lost a house down in here, my cousin lost a house that was badly damaged. The town has changed a lot. This main street used to be all oak trees; they're all gone," Riese adds.
People here say they may have lost bits and pieces of their town but they say ultimately they're thankful because here in Oakfield no lives were lost.
http://www.wbay.com/Global/story.asp?S=6481238
