We traveled back to Nebraska again! We were planning on a fairly uneventful quick trip. We arrived in the Scottsbluff area around 4 pm. Daniel and Dalton decided they were not wanting to go swimming that night (go figure), so we checked into a cheaper hotel in Morrill (just to the west of Scottsbluff). The clouds to the north were very dark, very very dark. On the country radio station they would interrupt every once in a while to announce a tornado warning. We did not think much of it, since the locals were outside mowing their lawn and kids were playing in the yards. We looked at the Pike property, the owner emphasized the great crawl space. It was just a crawl space to us, but since she made such a big deal about it Russell climbed down in it and took a picture. We decided to go to the pizza place on the east side of Scottsbluff. We took our time, allowing the storm chasers from the University of Florida, Texas A&M, and Oklahoma State to pass with ease. We did not worry since the local did not. The radio would cut in every few minutes, and tell us again about the tornado warning. The last warning came, within a short two minutes the radio cut in and it was a TORNADO, get to your basements or center of your homes away from windows. We were in our car, not near a home. Russell pulled into a parking lot, we prayed, and parked the car close to the baseball stadium seating. The car rocked, rolled, shook, and absolutely scared us to death. The hail was about the size of golf balls. The tornado went right by the hotel we would have stayed at. The conclusion of the story is, several cows were killed being hit by baseball size hail, the windows were busted out of the bank, the garden center at K-mart was demolished, the power poles at Menards fell, the roof at the car dealership came off, and the trailer park had damage enough to condemn the entire park. We have come to the conclusion, the crawl space is very, very, very important!!!! But, we are safe with a few pictures and looking forward to our future move!
