My daughter is freaking out over a tornado

[Big Ugly Tall Texan]

Apparently, a twister is active in the area of Lake Tawakoni, not far from where my daughter, SIL and grandbabies live in Greenville.

My daughter was born and raised in West Texas, but has never seen a tornado.

She called me all upset and wondering why the natives in that area were so calm about it. UI tried to explain that East Texans know there isn't much you can do, so we don't get too stirred up.

She made a friend recently and when my daughter called her, the friend said she was sitting outside watching the clouds.

When I worked for newspapers, I used to chase tornadoes and nearly caught a few of them.

I'm having fun with this.

[rodfair]

You are cruel and horrible BUTT....LOVE IT...You could throw into the conversation, as I do with my DAU, shes 15.
If praying dont work girl...put your head between your legs and kiss your a## goodbye!

[Crusty]

Yeah, BUTT, we up here in God's country get our fair share of tornados also. My daughter was frightened of them when she was young, but when she found me sitting out on our deck watching the funnel clouds she figured that that was alright. Since then she has also sat out and watched God's works with me. Now that she is in Tennessee, she has her son and daughter doing the same thing.

[panther]

I grew up on the East Coast and thought hurricanes were the worst things in the world. Then I moved to Kentucky and experienced my first tornado. At least when a hurricane comes you can watch it coming and know what to expect. A tornado drops out of a storm unexpectantly, takes out houses on one side of the street, leaves the other side untouched. I've seen trees along the side of a road that were broken in half. Rows of trees that had been broken at about a 7 foot height, but the tops of most of them were found miles away.
When my family that still lives at the coast talks about hurricanes I just smile. I respect those who live with the threat of tornadoes every year.

[gyro_cfi]

My first tornado experience was in Texas at Ft Hood. Don't want to ever be that close again. I'm afraid I don't find humor in Tornados. I'll be the first person in the basement every time. They seem to chase me not the other way around. A few years back when I was driving my car listening to the sirens and watching a wall cloud coming my direction. Got so scared I stopped at some guy's house, that I did not know, and asked if I could take shelter in his basement. He laughed and said sure. Yep, no dignity at all when it comes to tornados.

[texastaurusguy]

There are tornado warnings all over the place here. The ones your daughter is talking about are originating between Frisco and McKinney and working their way northwest. Very nasty storms, and I'm about ready for them to be done so they'll quit interrupting the football game.

[45 Forever]

Right now we got them dropping out of the sky all around us. Its bad two storms coming together right on top of us.

[Jake3501]

Most folks in Tornado country always try to have a plan. My house has a crawl space under it. Years ago when my daughter was first in her teens, the access to the crawl space was in one of her closets. A tornado was on the ground west of Lubbock, so I asked her to move the stuff from the floor area on top of the scuttle hole cover. The storm passed and I went into her room. Shoes, tennis rackets and all kinds of stuff all over her room. She must have looked like a dog digging a hole cleaning out her closet.

I just read a story on CNN about folks in the Dallas area getting caught in hail and then a funnel cloud appearing while they were in a convienience store and everyone going into the walk-in freezer for shelter. True they are thick walls, but are only made of foam sandwiched between two very thin peices of usually aluminum skin and the panels are interlocking and it really doesn't take much to seperate them. I guess they still offered more shelter from flying glass than anywhere else in the store, but are definitely not a tornado shelter.

[Smokewagon]

I've seen quite a few funnels and tornados from a distance, and one F5 from the inside. So I respect anyone's fear of these things, no matter how far away they are. The older I get, the more I keep my eye on the sky, when threatening clouds appear.

[texastaurusguy]

Around here, it's typically bad news if you get caught out in something like that. Nobody has a basement, the ground is just too hard and nobody bothers. You just have to use your head and improvise.