The 20 Year Anniversary of the Andover Tornado

April 26, 2011, is the 20 year anniversary of the F5 tornado that hit Andover, Kansas. Thousands of people were affected by this monster of a tornado that swept through Kansas on this fateful day. This includes my family and friends.

This day started like any other for most of us living in the state. We got up, went to work and about our business until the storms carrying this tornado struck the heartland and Kansas. I for one was at work still. My husband was at a technical school class. Our daughter was with his parents until I was to get off of work.

As the hail started coming down at 31st and Seneca, the tornado sirens started blasting. Customers were coming in telling us there was a tornado on the ground around McConnell Air Force Base heading to the Northeast. This is when I became scared beyond words. My husbands tech school was just north of McConnell.

As more news reports came in from a radio in the customer service desk that had decided to be turned on, we found the tornado was headed directly for Andover. I had a very sick feeling come over me at that moment.

You see, we had friends living in Andover. The one lady was the mother of a mutual friend of ours who was living in Oklahoma with her own family. One of her brothers lived in Wichita. Her sister was in Oklahoma or Texas; this part I do not remember to well.

Once I had managed to make it home, I had found our friend and her boyfriend's phone number and began calling to check on them. I was not able to get through after an hour of calling the number. After a moment of panic, I began looking for her son's, who is also a friend, phone number. I called several times with no luck of getting through either.

The problem I was having was one of two things. The phones would ring through with no answer. The other problem was I would get a busy circuit signal. This was due to the lines either being down or being tied up due to people doing the same thing as I was doing.

Then I tried calling our friend in Oklahoma to see if she had heard anything from her mother. Still no luck in contacting anyone who would know anything about our friends in Andover.

At one point in trying the all the phone numbers again, my husband had came home from class. He told me about watching the tornado from one of the backdoors of the school. As he described the monster F5 tornado, my jaw fell open in shock. He asked how bad it was at work. I preceded to tell him about the golfball to baseball sized hail, the damage to the cars, the rain and trying to find out about our friends mom and boyfriend.

After a couple more hours and one last try before bed, I did manage to get a hold of our friend's son in Wichita. He was on his way out to Andover to check on his mom and her boyfriend because he could not get a hold of her either. He said he couldn't get a hold of his sister in Oklahoma either because of the downed lines and busy circuits.

I told him I would give her a call and let her know what he told me. With one last attempt at midnight, I did get a hold of her and passed on his message.

It was not until a few days later the family called back to tell us their mother and her boyfriend had died in the Andover tornado. She was trying to help a neighbor to the shelter in their trailer park when the F5 hit. He did not survive either due to not wanting to go to the shelter.

With all the tornados outbreaks this year in April, I have thought a lot about our friends who died and her children; our friends.

Andover: 20 Years Later

Andover has rebuilt after this devastating day in April 1991. Those who lost everything, including family members and friends, will never forget.

KWCH had a news story on last night about photos that had been found after the tornado had slung people's lives around.

One man had been given back a photo album of his children. Others are laying out photos for families in Andover to pick up. They are doing this because the people who are doing this do not know who they belong to. Photos will be on display at the Andover City Hall until May 3.