North Texans awoke to a blanket of fog this morning, and the National Weather Service says there's a chance of showers and thunderstorms, some severe, later.
Visibility during the morning commute was less than a quarter-mile in some areas, the weather service said.
The fog lasted through late morning. The photo above is a shot of 7th Street at Throckmorton about 6 this morning.
High temperature today in DFW should be near 80.
The weather service says showers and thunderstorms are likely late this evening across much of North Texas, some possibly packing large hail and damaging winds.
Check out the latest forecast.
-- Tom Uhler
On Friday, Texas Sen. John Cornyn toured Arlington neighborhoods hit hard by Tuesday's storms. Here, he's with Arlington Mayor Robert Cluck, at right.
(Photo by Patrick Walker/Star-Telegram)
Seven dogs that wandered off from their homes following Tuesday's storms in Kennedale are now in the Fort Worth Animal Shelter.
Their photos have been released in hopes of reuniting them with their owners. Here's two of the dogs currently at the shelter.
Anyone whose pet is being cared for at Fort Worth’s Chuck Silcox Animal Shelter should contact the City of Kennedale at 817-478- 5416.
Once ownership is confirmed, associated kennel fees will be waived.
Pet owners can also go to a Facebook page created for animals lost in the storm.
-- Bill Hanna
Arlington officials on Wednesday released a map showing three zones hit hard by Tuesday's storms.
In the Chesterfield branch, off U.S. 287, 143 homes or apartments were damaged, 50 of them heavily.
In the Waterview branch, 102 homes were affected, with 16 having heavy damage.
In the Martin branch, 185 homes were affected: 123 with light damage, 40 with moderate damage and 22 with heavy damage, according to Fire Chief Don Crowson.
Here is a map of the damage zones:
The National Weather Service in Fort Worth is posting preliminary tornado rating updates on its Facebook page and its website as surveyors move through North Texas neighborhoods. Here are the latest posts:
LANCASTER: The Ellis/Dallas survey team has an estimated that the tornado in Lancaster was a high end EF-2 with maximum wind speeds of 125 to 130 mph. 300 homes were damaged in Lancaster. Most of them were single-family 1 or 2 story residences. The survey team will be headed into the city of Dallas soon to continue the assessment.
FORNEY: Preliminary ratings of damage in the Diamond Creek Subdivision in Forney, TX suggest damage up to EF-3 occurred. Wind speeds are estimated to be up to 150 mph. Several homes in the subdivision were destroyed and many other homes were badly damaged.
KENNEDALE: This image shows EF-1 damage to a single family residence off Sublett Road west of Highway 287 in Kennedale, TX. Note the partial loss of the roof and the garage door collapsed inward.
KENNEDALE/ARLINGTON: Survey in progress. Initial rating, at least an EF-2. Read about the Enhanced Fujitsu Scale.
The Insurance Council of Texas and Hailwatch released the hail map from yesterday's storms.
Two residents of the Green Oaks Nursing and Rehabilitation Center in Arlington were taken to hospitals with minor injuries after Tuesday's storms ripped the roof from a portion of the building at 3033 W. Green Oaks Blvd., said Jim Self, Arlington’s assistant fire chief.
Kyle Coleman, the center’s administrator, said nearly 200 people, including 113 residents, were in the building as the storm approached. They had gathered in the center of the building away from the windows when the door to the main dining room blew open and glass shattered.
Coleman said they could feel a vacuum force pulling on them.
“I don’t know if it sounded like a train, but it was definitely a feeling that I’ve never felt before,” he said.
The winds ripped the roof from the north wing of the K-shaped, one-story building. After the storm, residents moved to other facilities, including some who were taken out in wheelchairs and on gurneys, Self said.
-- Bob Cox
(Photo by Rodger Mallison/Star-Telegram)
The tornado skipped northeast across Kennedale, crossing Interstate 20 into a residential neighborhood near Arlington Martin High School.
John Smith watched it from his third-floor balcony, videotaping the tornado as it touched down and rose back up, zeroing in on a church school at St. Barnabas United Methodist Church, where his girlfriend and young son were inside. (Photo above, by Tim Madigan)
“It came right down here and shingles started flying in the air,” Smith said. “It got to within a couple of hundred yards of us, and I went back inside.”
At the church, Amy Richardson, director of the Early Education Center, was alerted to the approaching storm and shepherded 82 children, ranging from toddlers to 5-year-olds, from their classrooms to a safer spot in the interior of their building.
“We knew what we had to do. We had a plan for it,” Richardson said. “We just waited. We had pastors coming in to tell us when to duck and cover.
“There was a loud rumbling noise, the walls starting shaking and windows started breaking. But the kids were very calm. Some of them got upset when the power went out.”
Water began to pour into their sanctuary, because the tornado had ripped away the roof in another part of the building. But the children were safe.
“Our plan worked,” Richardson said. “It’s nice to have a plan.”
Just across Pleasant Ridge Road from the church, Ben Blackshear and his wife, Pamela, surveyed their home, which had been more or less destroyed. Pamela Blackshear had been home, on the telephone with her daughter, until just before the tornado hit.
“It was quiet. There was no wind,” Pamela Blackshear said. “Then it went right over us.
It sounded like a really strong whistle. It was hard to hear because the sirens were going off at the same time, and the dogs were barking.
“We just laid on the floor. Then we heard glass shattering, and the roof came off the house.”
When he got home, her husband found their roof across the road near the church.
“I put my blood sweat and tears into this house,” Ben Blackshear said. “I remodeled everything. It took me 15 years, and it was gone in 15 seconds. Oh my god.”
The tornado seemed to zero in on Dauphine Court, a quiet cul-de-sac less than a half mile away. Heather Schulz lives at the end of the street and, on Tuesday, was at home with her 5-year-old daughter, Hannah.
The mother tracked the storm on television as it barreled in her direction from Kennedale. She put Hannah in a bathtub and looked out her front window.
“I saw it coming at us from the end of the street,” Schulz said. “It looked like just a bunch of wind circling. I expected it to veer off in another direction, but it didn’t.
That’s when I jumped into the tub on top of Hannah and our little Yorkie. We were just praying. You could hear the cracking, popping.”
Hannah bit her thumb until it bled as the storm passed over. In less than a minute there was silence.
Schulz’s home sustained minor damage, shingles ripped off and mature trees snapped in two.
But several other houses on the street were mostly destroyed. In one place, Schulz said, a neighbor and her child took shelter in a front bathroom, while a back bathroom in the same home crumbled.
-- Tim Madigan
UTA students seeking shelter in the @UTAShorthorn newsroom. Photo by @Boweman55, Josh Bowe
Video of Kennedale tornado by @jabberwockkie
LANCASTER - Kevin Waters, a visiting health nurse, was with a patient at her Lancaster home Tuesday when they saw the sky turn a menacing shade of dark gray. They looked out the window and saw a tornado racing toward the patient's home on Pepperidge Drive.
Waters,the patient and a physical therapist who was also there crowded into a small bathroom.
"It sounds exactly like what they talk about - like a train coming through," he said. "You could hear the air swishing around you and the insulation started blowing under the door."
All of sudden the noise stopped and Waters peaked out the door. He saw the bright sky where the roof once stood.
The bathroom was the only room with a roof still over it. Furniture was strewn around the living room, a side bedroom was gone and chairs and clothes were strewn around the kitchen. Parts of the home's exterior brick was torn away.
Waters' Mustang parked out front had large dents to the front and back.
Other homes along the street also suffered serious damage. Dazed residents stood in the driveways next to battered vehicles, cell phones to their ears, describing their ordeals and the damage to relatives.
"I was pretty terrified," Waters said. "It's sort of a miracle we lived through it."
That's a picture of the house below.
-- Alex Branch
