Joplin, MO

Most of you know about the following I am sure...

The 2011 Joplin tornado was a large, extremely powerful, and fast-moving EF5 multiple-vortex tornado that struck Joplin, Missouri, USA, at about 5:41 p.m. CDT on Sunday, May 22, 2011. It was part of a larger late-May tornado outbreak sequence and reached a maximum width of in excess of 0.75 miles (1.21 km) during its path through the southern part of the city. It rapidly intensified and tracked eastward across the city, and then continued eastward across Interstate 44 into rural portions of Jasper County. This was the third significant tornado to strike Joplin since May 1971. Along with the Tri-State Tornado and the 1896 St. Louis-East St. Louis tornado, it ranks as one of Missouri's and America's deadliest tornadoes, and is likely to be one of the costliest; the cost to rebuild Joplin could reach $3 billion. The May 2011 tornado was the deadliest tornado to hit the United States since 1947 and the eighth-deadliest single tornado in U.S. history. As of June 5, officials reported that 141 people were killed by the tornado.

Last week, we drove through Joplin, MO on our trip to Tulsa.

We heard reporters say that pictures just do not do justice to the amount of destruction and damage there is in Joplin.

And they certainly do not.

As we drove down the main street we were on, it looks like a bomb went off and there is nothing but destruction as far as you can see.

And we were there about 2 weeks since the storm hit so I can't imagine what it looked like immediately after.

We saw cars completely destroyed, metal wrapped around trees that had been totally stripped of all their bark, we saw lumber, insulation and appliances everywhere, red X's on houses, messages of "we all made it" or "we will rebuild" spray painted on walls that were still left standing and so much loss.

It was really an erie and somber site to see.

So if you ever come across a "Help the Victims of the Joplin Tornado" donation jar or anything like that, donate.

They need it.