Nearly a year after 80-mph wind remnants of Hurricane Ike whipped through Clark County, Brown recalled that he was about to shepherd his 13-year-old daughter, Chelsea, and 2-year-old twin girls, Carah and Christa, into the basement.
Brown stopped to take one of the twins to the bathroom.
He saw the tree falling toward the house when he looked out of the window.
“I just stooped over and hugged Carah,” Brown said. “And I said, ‘Lord, let it miss the bathroom.’”
It did. The tree hit Buddy and Susie Brown’s bedroom, sending leaves and debris swirling into the house.
Between repairing the home that the Browns lived in for six years and shuttling back and forth between friends’ homes and hotels during the reconstruction, about $50,000 in expenses were incurred.
The family was out of the home for 14 weeks.
Damage to property in Clark County following the windstorm totaled more than $1.4 million, according to figures from Clark County Emergency Management Agency.
More than $1 million was provided in federal aid.
In the storm’s aftermath, county residents like the Brown family learned to take more precautions for emergency, while the EMA implemented new contingency plans.
The plans have “been born out of lessons learned in the windstorm of 2008,” said EMA Director Lisa D’Allessandris.
Contact this reporter at (937) 328-0374 or boutten@coxohio.com.
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