Union City, Mich. – Pam Kohler says the reality didn’t truly hit her until she saw it up close.
“When I first walked up to this this morning I started crying,” Pam said.
She and her husband, Steve Kohler, say it’s one thing to see this kind of devastation on the news. It’s another to stand in it.
“Our garage was right there. It’s gone,” Steve said.
The Kohlers, along with Pam’s sister-in-law, Laura Schaible, are from the Ann Arbor and Saline area. They bought this house nearly two decades ago as a family vacation spot.
Fortunately, they were not here when Friday’s EF3 tornado ripped through.
But their neighbors were.
“He sat right next to the fireplace, watching the news. He said the whole front of his house fell on top of him,” Schaible said.
Next door, another neighbor was digging through debris, trying to reach his trapped wife.
“Frank said he was going through the debris because his wife was trapped,” Schaible said. “But they did rescue her. He said she was fine.”
Branch County Sheriff Fred Blankenship said stories like that are common here, people helping one another in the chaotic minutes after the storm.
“A local business owner that was driving by took off his suit jacket and helped put pressure on a leg,” he said. “Our deputy was first on scene, recovered people from the rubble. A community like this, people are going to stop and help.”
Next, heavy equipment will move in to begin hauling away what’s left of homes and businesses.
Families will be allowed back in to search for whatever they can save. Sometimes, the smallest finds mean the most.
“We found a few things like a quilt my mom made, and that wasn’t even ripped,” Pam said.