HOUSTON – The National Weather Service confirms that an EF-1 tornado briefly touched down in Southwest Houston during a rash of tornadoes across Texas on Thursday.
A small, yet powerful tornado caused isolated damage to the Meadows Place neighborhood off of Kirkwood Road and Bissonnet Street.
According to a survey by the National Weather Service, wind speeds topped 90 miles per hour.
Several homes along Plumbrook Drive had damage, but one was severely damaged. The home belongs to Tanrita Johnson, a single mother of six.
“To look at all the damage, the garage door was gone, windows missing, roof fell in. It’s kind of hard to look at,” she told KRPC 2′s Gage Goulding. “It could have been worse. Lives could have been lost.”
Johnson wasn’t home at the time the tornado touched down around 2:30 p.m. on Thursday. Actually, no one was home. Not even the family dog.
Tanitra Johnson: “It’s a blessing to still have my children.”
Gage Goulding: “Does that run through your mind all the what ifs? What could have happened?”
Tanitra Johnson: “Yes, because I was like, what if I was home? I probably would have tried to run out because the windows came in to see what was going on.”
Neighbor’s security cameras captured the tornado moving through the neighborhood.
A few doors down, a security camera captured the moment a USPS mail truck was overturned with the postal worker still inside.
Thankfully, the person was okay and able to climb out.
“The safety and well-being of our employees are of the utmost importance to the U.S. Postal Service,” said a USPS spokesperson. “In the case of the recent weather-related incident, which occurred on December 27, we can report that the USPS employee is safe and recovering. The postal vehicle was retrieved, secured, and taken to the local Post Office. Additionally, the mail was recovered immediately, and the Postal Service took steps to ensure prompt delivery of all items. We appreciate and value our dedicated employees. The USPS will continue to monitor weather conditions closely and implement measures to safeguard both our employees and the mail they handle.”
It’s that video and other tale tell signs that helped the National Weather Service figure out what happened here.
“There is some evidence of some twisting,” said Science and Operations Office at the National Weather Service, Lance Wood. “So, this really looks like a brief touchdown and then that’s it.”
Wood was working the radar on Thursday when the Natoinal Weather Service was issuing tornado warnings.
However, a small, quick, yet powerful tornado like this one can sometimes slip under the radar.
Gage Goulding: “Was this cell here warned or no?”
Lance Wood: “No. We put out a significant weather advisory because we knew we were watching it really closely, but there was no tornado warning for this particular cell. I think it just happened too fast.”
Happening just as fast is the new dilemma Tanitra is facing: where will she and her kids sleep tonight?
“I really do need help,” she said.
The American Red Cross was out surveying damage today to offer assistance. They honed in on her home, the most damaged of all.
“This is going to take a while to, you know, be finished,” Johnson said. “So, I have to do something.”
