It’s Monday. For some, things are slowly getting back to normal. For others, their lives are forever changed.
Lilly Hampton gets in her car and takes a drive around town in the Florida Ridge area where some residents remain without power. Five days earlier, she and her family hid in a closet while speaking on the phone with her father, who alerted them the tornado was close by.
“He said do not leave the closet,” said Hampton, 32, of Dixie Heights. Hampton, her husband Brenton Kilbourne, 36, son, Preston Kilbourne, 4, and mother Claire Hampton, 65, were not hurt.
Video by Nick Samuel
Some homes in the quiet, tree-lined neighborhood were untouched while others, just across the street, were ravaged from the EF-3 tornado that formed in St. Lucie County and veered northeast into southern Indian River County.
“It just missed us. We could hear the roaring from a distance. The sky was eerie, green and black,” Hampton said. “The wind was plowing. My ears popped. That’s how close it was.”
Just a few blocks east of Hampton’s home, the tornado ripped roofs from residences, knocked down trees and overturned vehicles. Nearby streets painted a disastrous scene: a huge metal roof clinging to a downed power line, large trees uprooted from the earth and toppled onto homes and vehicles.
Hampton and her family helped residents clean debris left behind from the tornadoes created by Hurricane Milton. The tornadoes formed Wednesday all across the state of Florida, including at least three in Indian River County, meteorologists said.
“My husband helped a woman whose car was trapped under a tree. We’ve been volunteering with damage cleanups,” Hampton said. “I wish there was more national news coverage on this for Indian River County.”
Hampton said she’s thankful for the lineman working quickly to regenerate electricity to customers. Florida Power & Light Co. officials said they were aiming to restore 95 percent of power by Monday night for Indian River County.
The FPL power tracker showed more than 62,700 customers in the county had their power restored late Monday. The site showed 1,270 customers still without power. The outages from the storm impacted more than 64,000 customers in the county.
Hampton said the Florida Ridge community needs more help from state and federal officials. In the future, Hampton said she will evacuate instead of choosing to hunker down for hurricanes.
“It’s so devastating and heartbreaking what happened here in our town. Nobody was prepared for these tornadoes,” Hampton said. “It’s going to take a while for us to bring everything back (to normal). I’m thankful we have such a great community that’s come together to do what we can and help others who are unfortunate and going through this. There are families who don’t even have homes anymore.”
