ANNAPOLIS, Mo. – Residents in Annapolis, Missouri, spent Thursday cleaning up after a tornado ripped through the town Wednesday night. Mayor Scott Oatmen said people from all over Iron County came out to help with the cleanup.

“We were watching it, and it was just a normal thunderstorm. Then, right at about 9 o’clock, it just hit over here and then up into the school. It caused damage all throughout this whole area,” Oatmen said.

Oatmen, who serves as the city’s emergency management director, said the tornado dropped so quickly that there was no time to hit the sirens.

“It’s like this just built right before us and on top of us. I had been gone from here for just a few minutes. And within five minutes, it was here and gone,” he said.

The debris path shows the tornado touching down in a neighborhood.

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“It was just really, really loud and I grabbed ahold of her, and I just started praying. We both started praying,” Tara Patnaude said. “Then it was gone in about 30 seconds.”

Patnaude said her family had already taken shelter in their basement.

“All of the sudden, you could just feel the pressure change and I could feel wind in the house. We had no windows open,” she said.

Patnaude said the damage to their family’s home is just cosmetic. The miracle is that no one was hurt.

“God definitely protected our home and protected many of those around us, because no one was hurt,” she said.

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