By this time it was raining much harder, and when I stopped at the local Wal-Mart to top off my gas tank, I got soaked standing there watching the gas meter as it click, click, clicked my gas tank full.
The wind was also much stronger, and already the rain was blowing sideways. The electricity at the gas pumps went off a couple of times as I stood there, but I waited for it to come back on so I could be sure I had enough gas to drive to wherever I had to drive to find a safe place where we could ride out the worst of the storms.
After not finding a room in Marianna, my daughter called several of the motels in Dothan looking for a room, and for about 15 minutes she had no luck at all. Then one of the hotels she called told her there may be a few rooms left at the Marriott Courtyard, but that they were filling up fast. The clerk was very nice and offered to connect her with the Marriott, and to our delight we found they did in fact have one room left. She told them we’d take, and that we were headed that way from Marianna, and would be there in about 45 minutes. Not likely, as I soon found out, because I was about to take the wildest ride of my life.
At approximately 9:30 PM I drove down by the Sykes building and remarked to my wife that it appeared as if everyone had left the building. There were no cars in the parking lot, and as I slowly rolled by the building, I recalled how safe the central rooms were supposed to be. I wished at that moment that I still had my badge that would allow me to get into the building through the back door. My old office was in a corner location, and I had always thought it would be a very safe place to hunker down if a storm came. It was only because I no longer had the badge that I continued driving toward Dothan. Thank God for no badge!
If anything, the wind and rain were getting worse. The van whipped violently from side to side as I desperately tried to hold in on the road. I had no idea where we were or how much farther we had to go to reach Dothan and the perceived safety of a hotel room.
I had the radio tuned to a station that was broadcasting the news from the local television station, and I listened in horror as the story of the Marianna tornados unfolded.
Go to the Time-Series of Hurricane Ivan Images for a look at Ivan from space.My knuckles were white on the steering wheel, and I was more scared than I have ever been. I wanted to pull over, ride out the storm on the side of the road, but I had no choice but to keep driving.
The announcer’s voice was trembling as he brought us the latest news! The largest of the tornados first destroyed much of a mobile home park in the Blue Springs area, and was now headed directly for Highway 71. We were driving on Highway 71!
Tears came to my eyes as I heard him mention the little towns of Two Egg and Greenwood! We were only minutes away from both!
I couldn’t help but listen to the voice of the announcer as he described the storm, and as Highway 71 turned into Highway 53, again I cringed as he said the tornado appeared to be headed for Highway 53. Highway 71 turns into Highway 53, and we had just hit that section of the road. We were a few miles from Campbellton, Florida, when he mentioned that town as well!
The last blow came when the announcer said that the tornado now seemed to be headed towards South Dothan! We were going to South Dothan!
Perhaps the only smile of the night came then…In a course laugh, not much more than a rasping whisper, I told my family to hold on, because it looked as though I must have a gigantic tornado homing device affixed to the top of the van, and the thing was determined to follow me everywhere I went.
Another of my gravest concerns was when the announcer kept saying the tornado was traveling at about 50 to 60 miles and hour, and the fastest I could drive and hold the car on the road was between 45 and 50 miles per hour.
The tornado was catching up with us, there was no doubt about it. I heard my wife softly praying as I peered through the windshield and time after time I asked my wife and daughter to look out the window and see if the tornado was anywhere close.
The only consolation was my beautiful grand-daughter Braxten when she softly sang the words Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so, and then followed that with the old children’s rhyme, Rain rain, go away, come again another day.
She stopped singing and then spoke with the wisdom only a child can have. “Don’t worry PaPa, you’ll out run the storm! You won’t let anything happen to me!” Nothing ever sounded so sweet in my life. I hung on her words and drove like a mad man.
I couldn’t see, I was shaking so hard I almost couldn’t hold the wheel, and I was having trouble breathing. Over the past 20 of so years, I’ve had a couple of heart attacks, angioplasty and quadruple bypass surgery, and I remember praying for nothing more than for the next heart attack to hold off long enough for me to get my family to safety, and for the strength I knew I needed to last out the trip.
I honestly don’t know what happened when I heard Braxten’s voice, filled with the faith of a child, but it was almost a tangible thing!
The rain didn’t let up, the howling of the wind seemed louder than ever, but somehow my hands steadied and my heartbeat slowed, and I was back in control of the van. Not exactly having a great time, but still alive, still driving, and still headed for the safety of the hotel room in Dothan.
We almost shouted when in the distance we saw...
