Dad, pregnant mom & six kids huddle as tornado tears through neighborhood
HAYS COUNTY (KXAN) -- Thursday, May 12 was supposed to be a day of celebration for Aaron Snow's family. It's his wife's due date for their seventh child to be born. Then a tornado tore through their yard.
Shortly after 1 a.m., weather radar showed rotation just west of San Marcos and the Summer Mountain Ranch neighborhood. The National Weather Service has confirmed two tornadoes formed less than two miles apart in the same area.
"By the time the alert went off, it was 60 seconds when the tornado ripped through here," Snow said.
His phone's emergency alert woke he and his wife.
"I can't even describe it. It was the most intense thing ever, like howling wind and the house was shaking and there was water and debris coming somehow in through."
After the rain stopped, Aaron and the children went outside to check on their animals: dogs, baby goats and chickens. The coup and chicken run are now tangled in a tree. The family swing was ripped from the ground. The trampoline, pierced.
Several chickens remain unaccounted for.
Behind the home, a shed and goat barn were torn from the ground and moved several feet. A bucket of water for the goats remained in place, demonstrating the odd power of these storms.
The family is OK and the baby is still on the way.
"Our midwife actually just left. She came by to do her check. [My wife is] doing OK. She's great. The kids are good. It's one of their birthdays today, so we woke up and did the birthday thing," Snow said.
Next door, Ren Sarns and his wife cleaned up a mess left behind by the storm. A year earlier, they just finished a renovation and planned to sell their home. Then a hail storm swept through the area. Now another storm leaves its mark.
"By the time the wife got in [the safe room] and I was still trying to shut the door, the windows popped. You could hear it. She said 'What's that?' 'It's a tornado.' The fan in our bedroom would go 'wooo!' 'Cause air was being sucked out," Sarns said.
He thinks the tornado passed over their house. The roof bent and warped from the suction of the twister.
Outside, the roof of the well was ripped off. Dirt and leaves were stuck to walls. Sconces are shattered on the ground.
Worst of all, he said, old trees are split or uprooted.
It was a similar situation a few miles away where Charles Gunn cleared away branches from his sister-in-law's home. A tree fully uprooted just a few feet from the driveway. The homeowner told KXAN she slept through the storm.
Gunn said this isn't the first time he has helped clean up the property after a tornado.
"This is the worse I've ever seen it," he said.
All three men said the same thing: they expect it will take months to recover.
National Weather Service officials were on the scene throughout the day Thursday. After analyzing the data, they said the tornado was an EF-0.