Tornado Season

We have experienced a busy tornado season.  Mid May tornadoes hit Cleburne and Granbury.  We quickly found a church to partner with us (us meaning Mercy Chefs) in Granbury.  My hubby took the trailer and dropped it off in Granbury, and then we went to get the food.  He is in the truck with me following behind.

First food delivery in Granbury, and already the paparazzi found us...

Here is my hubby making fresh bread...

Wonderful volunteers from our church prepping chicken...

All set up at First Assembly...

Leaving town one night, what gorgeous views!

The day we left Granbury, more tornadoes hit multiple towns in Oklahoma.  This time we dropped the Mercy Chefs trailer off in North Ft Worth for the driver to take to Oklahoma.

Such a strange night...I wondered if we would have storms, too.

My hubby was able to spend much more time in Oklahoma than I did-they set up at Southgate Baptist Church in Moore.  I arrived after they had been there over a week.  When I got there it was just in time for dinner service.

They had been serving 3000 people per meal each day, but by the time I got there the need was lesser.  Because of the immediate need, 2 Mercy Chefs trailers were working in tandem to produce enough food.  This picture was taken standing in front of one trailer; the other was to the left, and to the right is a refrigerator truck Sysco had donated the use us for the course of this disaster.  And in the middle, the preparation tent.

 I sent my son off with my camera to take a few pictures.  This is part of the church building.

Debris was everywhere.

 To serve meals, we plated up food in the trailer, and passed it through this window.

Here are a few of us plating up some food.

Once outside, the food was loaded onto Kubota's, and driven into the disaster areas for delivery.

 Part of the clean up process...

The tornado dropped this trailer off on the church property.  I believe someone told me it was from across town.

 Storage in the back of the Sysco truck...

More destruction...

Another view of the set up...

Preparing the cinnamon rolls to rise...

Southgate Baptist Church had a huge gym full of donations.  They had water lining the driveway to direct traffic through.

A pile of donations...

After that evening of work, we drove into Oklahoma City for our hotel.  Even in that town, there were many stoplights that were crooked like this one.

This was a normal scene...

In Oklahoma City, there were many buildings without power.  It was kind of eery to drive through a city passing so many buildings with no lights on.

This is our hotel...thankfully the damage was limited to the outside of the building.

Back to work the next day...

I snapped a few pictures on my way to the grocery store.

Since the city had not yet deemed the church safe, church services were held under this pavilion towards the very back of the picture.

Since the number of people being fed has gone down, and our trailer got some damage to it, we loaded it up to take it home.  The other trailer will be in Moore for a month to continue feeding.

I handed my son my camera as we were leaving town.  The tornado that hit town after the initial tornado must have taken some of these letters away.

I don't believe I have ever seen this type of devastation before.  It was just so incredibly widespread-so many people lost their homes.  The town of Moore, and the other towns that were affected, will never be the same.  I am so grateful for the time I was able to serve.