Tornado recovery continues

Karlee Avery, Hi-Times Staff Writer

Nearly five months after an EF3 tornado ripped through the streets of Tupelo, the city is still recovering.

“I think we’re doing as well as possible considering the extent of damage from the tornado,” Tupelo Mayor Jason Shelton said in an interview with The Hi-Times. “As a city, we’re right on track. Within weeks of the tornado hitting, we replaced over 200 utility poles and transformers to restore power to every part of the city and finished the vast majority of debris removal by July 26. Our immediate and short-term response was excellent as a result of the great work of our city’s department heads that have done the heavy lifting for disaster recovery.”

The Joyner and Clayton Avenue area sustained most of the damage from the tornado, which hit on April 28. At St. Luke United Methodist Church, a security camera caught footage of the tornado ripping through the playground, showing debris being thrown around like Matchbox cars.

Across the county, senior Camille Bauer rode out the storm in her basement.

“My dad told us that we all had to go down into the basement and I didn’t believe him,” Bauer said. “I went outside and I was like, ‘Dang, we really do need to go down to the basement.’”

After her father raced upstairs to get his shoes, Bauer heard a loud noise and saw him start running downstairs.

“At this point, all the lights are out and he dove into the corner with us. We were all really scared,” Bauer said. “We opened the front door and our deck was fallen down and there were hundreds of trees down around us. Down the road, several houses were gone. It was just a really sad time for everyone, because so much damaged happened where I live.”

Bauer said damage to her home has now been repaired.

“It cost us a lot of money to fix everything and it’s just now getting back to normal,” Bauer said. “My heart goes out to everyone that was affected more than I was.”

Although Tupelo has come a long way, the city is still in the process of returning to normal – which will be costly.

“Anytime something like this happens to the city, there’s going to be an adverse impact on the municipal budget, but fortunately the city of Tupelo is financially sound,” Shelton said. “The total cost to taxpayers to the city and Tupelo Public School District will exceed $10 million, but the vast majority of those expenses will be recouped through the FEMA and MEMA reimbursement programs.”