The tornado that hit Joplin Missouri in May 2011 devastated a large swath through town. The first video below was recorded as the tornado hit a gas station/minimart.  The people in the store ended up huddled in the storage refrigerator in back and were extremenly lucky to survive.  The person who made this video explains:

The video i took while at Fastrip on east 20th street. We huddled in the back of the store until the glass got sucked out , then ran into the walk in storage fridge. Sorry for the lack of visuals but the audio is pretty telling of how intense the storm was. The tornado hits at around 1:20 seconds.

The next day, this person documented the structure from the outside.  You can see how fortunate these people were to survive this tornado.  Y9u can hear a lot of praying to Jesus during the tornado.  I think this is why these people survived without injury.

Aftermath

Update

Two months after the tornado, recovery efforts were just beginning.  The city had been focusing on cleaning up the mountains of debris. More than 7,000 homes were destroyed.  The May 22 tornado killed 159 people, displaced 5,000 workers, smashed 10 public school buildings and ruined 18,000 cars.

The TV show Extreme Makeover is building 7 homes in Joplin and I am sure will be on the television soon.  It looks like a long recovery time for Joplin.  Keep them in your prayers.  If you would like to help, see the links below.

If you would like to help

• Rebuild Joplin
• Joplin Tornado Funds