Tornado damages home, orchard

Enterprise Editor

clydenews@bizwoh.rr.com

Friday morning Crystal Kirchenbauer was walking around the outside her home at 5196 CR 175 in the midmorning heat taking photographs of the damage a tornado or funnel clouds caused the night before.

Her front port was ripped off, sections of roof shingles laying in the filed across the road, trees and huge branches cluttered the yard and her three-car garage was shoved northwest about 6 inches busting the foundation.

Officials received reports of funnel clouds over U.S. 20 and CR 175 and a trained weather spotter sited one over Eshleman Fruit Farms around after 8 p.m. Thursday as part of a large storm front traveling across Northwestern Ohio. While a tornado warning was issued for Western Sandusky County, little was reported about dangers in the Clyde area until the City Police sounded the tornado warning at 8:38 p.m. - after the county warning expired at 8.

Kirchenbauer said Thursday night and even Friday morning, officials and her insurance company did not believe the house was hit by a tornado.

"We like heard this explosion," she said, explaining she and her husband Clay were sitting in the living room when a window in the front of the house blasted in sometime after 8 p.m. Thursday. The couple had just returned home from Sandusky and knew about a tornado warning for Woodville, and the west side of the county - but heard nothing about what was coming at Clyde. Since they had satellite dish - they did not have a chance to see warnings in the minutes before the storm hit. After the storm the satellite dish was dented and mangled.

"It moved our air conditioner away from the house," she added, noting it was still working. On Thursday night, friends and a neighbor aided the young couple in securing the property - covering the roof with a tarp.

"It was so scary," she said about the tornado. "It sounded like all the windows in the house were crashing in."

When the front window busted out, the couple ran to the basement to wait and see what was left of their home later when the storm passed.

Kirchenbauer said her neighbor had a camera phone and recorded three funnel clouds going up and down in the field coming from the west.

On Friday afternoon, Betty Eshleman said they knew there were reports of a funnel cloud coming down Thursday night over the family orchard near the corner of Ohio 101 and CR 260. She said initially it did not seem as if there were any damage.

On Friday morning, workers discovered there was damage.

The tornado took down 122 cherry trees and six apple trees in the orchard.

Eshleman said the business does not have insurance for the trees.

"It's just a lot of six year old trees," she said, noting the cherry trees were in their prime. The plus, besides not losing any buildings, was that the farm had harvested the cherries for this season and the tornado did not hit the Red Haven peaches which are just now ready for market, she said.