4 = THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
NEWS
WEDNESDAY,JUNE4,2003
DISASTER
Graduate student triumphs over tornado
By Annie Bernethy
aberneth@kansan.com
Kansan staff writer
Scott Reynolds/Kansan
Brooke Weldron, Ottawa graduate student, and Aleaka Apt, iola graduate student, are in good spirits in front of their tornado-ravaged home. The two roommates' apartment was struck by a tornado last month. They are moving back to their respective hometowns and then to Kansas City because of the damage the apartment received.
Zach Straus/Kansan
Aleaka Apt, Iola graduate student, walked to her kitchen after a weather man informed her that the tornado watch in Lawrence was not near her apartment at 4704 Ranch Court. As she passed a window and glanced out, she saw a dark cloud over her neighbor's house heading towards her. Apt dove for the bathroom as the tornado passed directly over her apartment.
"It sounded like a train coming through," Apt said. She was home alone on May 8 when the tornado touched down.
The tornado broke almost all the windows in her apartment and pushed the east-facing wall about four inches away from the structure. Apt called her dad immediately after.
"I was like, 'What do I do now?'" she said.
Pieces of insulation and shingles from other apartments were now in Apt's living room. Her garage door was bent and could not be opened. However, Apt was mostly concerned with getting in touch with her roommate Brooke Waldron, Ottawa graduate student and letting her family and friends know she was OK. She found her shoes within the rubble and headed outside.
She had just experienced the first significantly damaging tornado to hit Lawrence since 1981. The tornado in 1981 killed one man in the K-Mart at 3106 Iowa.
There were no deaths in the tornado storm that hit Lawrence in May. The National Weather Service classified the Lawrence tornado as an F-2 on the Fujita tornado damage scale. An F-2 tornado is classified by winds ranging from 113-157 mph, which usually damages roofs, destroys mobile homes and splits trees.
The tornado damaged 192 dwelling units in 98 buildings in Lawrence.
The tornado that struck Lawrence was one of 11 tornadoes in northeastern Kansas that night said Mike Akulow, warning coordination meteorologist for the National Weather Service.
Raintree Montessori School, 4601 Clinton Parkway, sustained an estimated $6,393,276 worth of damage, said Paula Phillips, director of the Emergency Management Office of Douglas County.
The Kansas Insurance Department said the storms and tornadoes that hit Lawrence caused about $5 million in insured losses in a report published by the Lawrence Journal World Saturday.
The Salvation Army helped put people up at local hotels. Apt and her roommate
stayed at the Holiday Inn Holidome, 200 McDonald Drive, which gave victims of the tornado discounted rates.
Hy-Vee, 3504 Clinton Parkway, gave
Apt and Waldron cameras to document the damage for insurance purposes. Apt said she was lucky the renters insurance her parents purchased covered all of her and
A tormade touched down in southwest Lawrence on May 8,2003, damaging buildings and destroying many KU students' property.
her roommate's possessions
The American Red Cross aided victims by giving vouchers for household items, said Jane Blocher, executive director of the American Red Cross Douglas County Chapter.
Apt and Waldron moved out of their Aberdeen apartment because it had significant water damage from rain storms after the tornado. Crews patched their roof, but the large amounts of rain Lawrence received in the days after the tornado leaked through the patches, further damaging their apartment.
Apt is moving in with her parents in Neosho, Mo., for the summer, and plans to return to Lawrence in the fall to finish her graduate degree.
But not all the tornado's damages were detrimental, Apt said.
"Igot out of taking my final," she said. "I wished my car would have been outside so I could have gotten a new one."
— Edited by Brandon Baker