Town Of Ben Wheeler Hit By Tornado Before Van
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BEN WHEELER(CBSDFW.COM) - Raymond "Dan" Bond says there was no warning Sunday night."
"I was holding the door. It was trying to suck the door out, the whole time," says Bond. "I never left the door."
Bond says the tornado blew right over his house while he, his wife, their children and grandchildren were holed up inside.
"I actually told the good Lord if he would just take me and leave them, I was happy with that," says Bond who felt powerless.
"When it went to ripping the roof off, the whole house went to vibrating and shaking, so I mean, we were pretty fortunate."
All the while, his family hid in the safest part of the house.
"My wife grabbed the grandkids and they went in back," says Bond. "My daughter and them was sitting on the floor and they were sitting on the floor and they were all trying to get in this little room."
Seven of them squeezed in. Bond says his daughter helped the elderly woman who lives just across the street. The twister downed giant trees onto the house and ripped the roof off. The woman inside walked out without any injuries.
Bond says the twister picked up a large 20,000-pound shipping container and threw it, and it landed in a pasture, a quarter-mile away."
Bond says as he and his family try to rebuild, they worry about what comes next.
"They said we have more rain coming. My grand kids were all crying, the storms are coming again. It's like almost, it bothers me a little bit," says Bond. "It devastates me that they had to go through this kind of stuff."
Bond says they remember three years ago when a tornado hit near them. The damage wasn't nearly as bad that time. But Bond says the latest twister is more than they can take.
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