9/11 Short Stories

The “Tornado Town, USA” article, published on May 26, 2016 by Maggie Koerth-Baker enlightens us about the menacing natural disaster known as tornado. The purpose of this piece, or how I viewed it, is to inform us about how tornadoes form and what their capabilities. Mrs. Baker, through her writing, pursues to better educate us on the terrifying and chaotic nature of a tornado. I believe Mrs. Baker exquisitely uses the logical and emotional appeal in order to hook and sedate readers into her writing.

It was a seemingly normal, sunny day in Kansas. It did began to rain, but that was normal, rain happens everywhere. I still remember everything from what I was doing, and where I was at. This is the story of the tornado that ripped through my town in 2011.

Once upon a time, there was a girl named Ryleigh Michelle Braun. It was a dark and stormy night at the Braun household; full of peculiar noises coming from tree branches tapping on windows and windshield wipers screeching across car windshields. Ryleigh was wailing uncontrollably because of the storm, and her parents couldn’t figure out a way to calm her down. They tried singing her favorite lullabies and giving her milk. They even told her that she could sleep in their bed. None of these things helped soothe Ryleigh. She continued to cry and would scream every time she heard the, “BOOM” of thunder. Finally, her parents thought of reading her a book. They picked Winnie the Pooh. By the time they got to the third page, Ryleigh’s tears stopped

“What is wrong with you?” Ellie exclaims out loud. She doesn’t care when the few people she passes turn to stare at her. “He is just a man, granted, a remarkably hot, good looking one. However, that is no excuse for you behaving like a love struck teenager.” Sighing Ellie scans the street for the restaurant Becky recommended. There, just down the street, Sarah’s Cozy Café, she starts walking quickly towards it.

The article A Mile-Wide Tornado Hits Texas is one of my best articles because it makes important news interesting. Moreover, the story has proper grammar, punctuation, and spelling, which help make it a better article. It also has good sentence lengths which make the article smooth. My paper also includes descriptive terms and phrases to further explain ideas and facts. Furthermore, I am proud of the introduction because it is really descriptive and inviting. This article includes good and interesting details that were chosen from many sources and put into this article. It also has a few quotes from eyewitnesses that experienced the tornado in Texas that make the article fascinating.

It had been dark and overcast the entire day, but as night approached the true intensity of the storm erupted into a light show of lightning and a symphony of thunder. The rain didn’t just fall, rather it blew in sideways in ribbons of cold and icy stinging pellets that tried to cut at Mike and Katie’s exposed cheeks. Mike tilted his head into the wind and clutched his coat collar closed with his left hand while pulling Katie close with his right and heading them both toward the bright sterile lights of the emergency room entrance.

As they cut across two more lawns to get to another street, the clouds were super close. All of the sudden sirens start blaring all around town! Trajan and Damon looked at each other with fear in their eyes and said in unison, “Tornado”, but it was very difficult to hear because of the howling of the wind and the intensity of the sirens. All three of them took off sprinting down the street. As Makenna started falling behind, Trajan took her backpack so she could try and keep up. They continued running at a pace that would have beat Usain Bolt. The wind and sirens deafened them as they ran down the street. They could see the clouds rotating just outside of town as they made it down that final street that lead to their back yard and safe haven of their

I had just exited the barber shop when my dad was waiting for me inside his van. I agreed to help my aunt move her household items into boxes in preparation for her new home. I agreed to help because not only was I close to my aunt; I also get to see my cousin, Joseph. I had kept my thoughts about him throughout the car ride until we finally arrived at my aunt’s house. As usual, she ran outside to welcome me and my dad warmly while Joseph stood on the doorway watching us from the shadows. When I walked up to him to say my greetings, he did the same but he wasn’t as enthusiastic as the three of us. With that, my Dad worked alongside our aunt while I was paired with my cousin who was in charge of carrying living room furniture out of the house.

Meanwhile, Russ, Ron, Amy, and I was walking in the towering jungle that was our backyard. Suddenly the ground was shaking harder than a jet engine. They are massive winds similar tornadoes. The lawn mower came out. The suction of the lawn mower is related to a tornado’s wind’s. All of us ran, I tried to find a way to escape, but the tornado winds were too strong for us. The ground was shaking and the winds picked us up.

The house remained dark and the storm seemed to just keep getting worst by the minute. Ellie listened to the rain hammer down onto the tin roof like millions of gun shots. Upstairs Ellie could hear a door opening and closing, making a slam noise every time it shut. Ellie creeped up the tall oak stairs. Trying to be as dainty and quiet as a mouse. Ellie could feel her stomach-turning upside down. Ellie kept telling herself everything was fine, it was just the wind. The noise of the door continued. Ellie reached to top of the stairs. Walked over to her bedroom, where the door was aggressively slamming.

Paul Crenshaw uses many anecdotes and personal experiences in this story. He describes his grandfather’s meteorology skills and his first experience seeing a tornado. These personal anecdotes made the story much more interesting and relatable to me. I love seeing and hearing storms, so I was very interested when reading Crenshaw’s vivid description of the tornados. For example, in this quote, Crenshaw describes the sound of the tornado: “It seemed as silent as noise can be, a faint howling that reached us over the rain, almost peaceful from a distance” (Crenshaw, 2004, p.205). In this quote Crenshaw points out one of the things that I enjoy the most about storms: the howling and moments of silence. His description of the tornado, even though I have never personally experienced one, was my favorite part of the reading because it reminded me of why

“Run, run!” said my neighbor. I heard the screeches of crying babies and children. There was no sight of anything, all I saw was fog. “Where are my babies?” I had yelled out. I was distraught! I had dropped down to my knees and cried my eyes out. There was no sign of anything or anyone near me and my husband has not made it home yet. I had begun to believe that we were not going to make it. The fog had gotten even worse now. The police, firefighters, or ambulance couldn’t even go help people who were in trouble because they couldn’t see. “HELP, HELP, HELP!” I had heard a voice but it was faint, very faint. “HELP, HELP, HELP!”I had heard it again, but this time it sounded familiar. And indeed it was…

Windows exploded as the storm sustained its wrath. Shards pierced soft bodies. My father wrapped in blood. Next to him, sat on a pile of wet paper, my mother -- grasping a rosario as she clutched my 10-year old brother. I looked down the stairs – all I saw was a surge of thick brown water determined to cover the entire first floor. In shock, we had no choice but to wait. Outside, I saw tangled electric posts as they collapsed like dominoes. Cars, bikes and buses rushed through waters stacked a mountain pile. The storm was only the tip of the iceberg; aftermath worse.

The drumming of the heavy rainfall gave me a sick feeling in my stomach.Cars zoomed by swashing small puddles onto the curb beside my feet.As I bent the corner trudging through the rain I could see a shadow of my house in the distance through the thick fog that surrounded me.As I got closer,I could hear the muffled sound of a smoke alarm goin off.”Mom tried to cook again”I thought.Before I could knock,my dad opened the door flinging a rag in the air.

The traffic traveled franticly that day, forcing our old, rusty, black avalanche to exceed the maximum speed limit on Highway 13. We neared Central City, Iowa, approximately twenty minutes from our countryside home. My mom mentioned previously that it started to appear quite gloomy in the sky. I slowly rolled down the back window next to my seat when the heavy, damp smell of a storm emerged into my nose like a frog approaching its prey. Ominous clouds shifted back and forth in the sky when mom finally told me to check the weather radar on her phone as she fiddled with the radio. The radio signal only let out various pitches of static. Before I could check the radar, a loud boom rumbled in front of me; my mom slammed on the brakes, and my grandma began latching onto her armrest. A massive oak tree lay in front of us on the road, blocking all oncoming traffic. Somehow mom managed to swerve around the tree as the now impending storm began to swirl around us. Within a matter of seconds, hail pounded our windshield, rain blinded the outside world, and the wind whipped even faster, obliterating everything in its sight. At five years old, I shook while genuine terror filled in my beady eyes. My brave mother knew we couldn’t pull over as the wind would carry our car off the road as if we were a small can of soda. She kept driving through what seemed only dark grey ahead of us.