No timeline for return of tornado-hit Precision Materials

Apr. 15—It's still too early to say when Precision Materials will be back in operation again in Ohatchee, plant manager David Slade said Wednesday.

"We're probably going to take it down to a concrete slab," Slade said of the storm-damaged site.

Precision Materials, a plant near Alabama 77 that made components for furniture and flooring, was ground zero for the EF-3 tornado that struck Calhoun County on March 25.

Twenty-two employees including Slade survived the storm here after moving to a sheltered area of the property, Slade said. No one died at the factory, though the tornado killed five in other parts of the county.

But the plant itself, at least 40,000 square feet according to the company's publicity materials, collapsed in the tornado's winds. Meteorologists later used the damage at the plant site to bump the tornado up from an EF-2 to an EF-3, saying it would have taken winds of 140 mph to do this much damage.

Three weeks after the storm, the site seems little changed. Slade said he's hard at work assessing the massive damage there.

"Right now I'm full time on getting this site picked apart," he said.

Twenty-eight people worked at the plant. Slade said some have moved on to other jobs, and some were offered the chance to work at other parts of the North Carolina-based company.

"We're not going to be back in business in the immediate future," he said.

Elsewhere in the storm zone, there were signs Wednesday of growing order among the chaos. On the roads near Ragan Chapel Methodist Church, piles of trees still line the road and backhoes still dig at mounds of debris that were once houses.

But there are fewer debris piles than there were a week ago, often piled in yards scraped clean of garbage or grass.

Emergency management officials put out an announcement Wednesday reminding people to be patient in their wait for debris trucks. County contractors last week began making the rounds of the storm zone, hauling away debris, but emergency management officials say collection could take weeks.

"We want people to know that there are going to be multiple passes in this process," said Calhoun County EMA spokeswoman Tiffany DeBoer. "They're going to drive by and pick up debris, and we want residents to keep pushing debris out to the road."

DeBoer said the EMA sent out the reminder to "get ahead" of any public concerns about the pace of debris pickup. She said the EMA has heard few complaints so far and that the public has been patient with the process.

For many residents in the storm zone, this isn't their first time cleaning up. The March 25 tornado is the third to hit Calhoun County in the past decade.

Ohatchee and Wellington have each been hit twice in that time.

Capitol & statewide reporter Tim Lockette: 256-294-4193. On Twitter @TLockette_Star.