Iowa City is a disaster zone.
Erin + I were finishing dinner at the Red Avocado when it hit; we’re okay, but we came awfully close to walking outside right as the tornado descended upon the neighborhood. The weather was getting really sketchy and we thought we should leave to go home; but one of the women working there convinced us to stay in with them.
Seconds later, the power went out, the air got really weird, it became UTTERLY silent..we 8 folks went into the kitchen and huddled in the cooking area (luckily the Red Avocado is a basement establishment).
The air pressure changed and our ears popped..the hair on my arms prickled. And then suddenly it was like something big went through the room..kind of an invisible entity. It must’ve just been the air pressure changing though. It let out a sigh, during which I brilliantly deduced that, “I think it’s gone!”, and we went to look out the front door. We saw the white funnel cloud skipping eerily away Northast towards I-80 (my dad says that tornadoes always travel Northeast so in a bad situation, run South)
After about 15 minutes of staring out the window and waiting to feel like things were okay, we went outside and there’s utter destruction everywhere. College Green park was decimated, chimneys were in the road..one of my car windows got sucked out, as did that of our friend Frank who happened to be dining with us. Power lines down..rubble all over. people wandering in a daze.
We drove home, wihch was eerie b/c there’s no power in our neighborhood..so no street lights, no traffic lights..totally dark. Eventually we walked downtown with our friends Steve and Allison..we just wandered with the huge crowds. Totally surreal, kind of apocalyptic. You can see photos at The Press Citizen that kind of convey the strangeness.
There was a bad, hours-long gas leak on Iowa Avenue that kept everyone away from there. Trees everywhere just ripped up out of the ground, tops of buildings just gone. Cars turned over, smashed..it’s crazy.
We went to see St. Pat’s over on Court Street. Apparently there were 70 people at a late mass (Easter weekend, you know) when the sirens went off. The Reverend said people should either go to the rectory or the basement. They chose the basement and then the entire roof of the church got sucked away. The law frim next to the johnson county courthouse..the second story is completely gone, and it was a brick structure. Happy Joe’s is gone, Dairy Queen on Riverside Drive is gone. Menards + Wal-Mart lost their roofs. Starbucks lost its roof, but was still serving lattes this morning. (they were recently shut down by city officials tho!)
When Erin + I walked past the Red Avocado this morning, the building owner guy (and sometimes waiter at RA) said, “ha ha ha! all the local vegan and organic businesses survived! Happy Joes and Dairy Queen are gone! ha ha ha!” He seemed a bit manic, sweeping debris and smoking a huge cigar.
Our little city is all messed up! The trees from College Green Park will be the biggest ultimate loss, I think..at least as far as how the city looks, overall. I put up some pictures from my walk to work, over at Flickr.
