Fortunately, we were on our way to Melanie’s cousin’s wedding in Virginia, instead of being 150 feet from a tornado early Wednesday morning!

We stayed over at Mel’s parents’ place Tuesday night & left for the wedding at around 4:30 a.m. The forecast called for heavy rain & thunderstorms for the region that morning. So, by the time we got to New Jersey, it was pouring really hard already. Although it was also really windy, the possibility of tornados just never came across our minds.

My Mom in Utah actually called me twice Wednesday night, when we were still on our way back to New York. She & my sister knew that we live in one of the areas that the news had mentioned, & they also saw a video clip on the news that showed a backyard that looked very familiar. So my sister insisted on calling us.

It turns out that the last place the tornado touched down was the block (58th Street) across from where we live (59th Street). If you don’t know Brooklyn/New York streets, that’s only like 150 feet from our front door!

58th Street is still closed for the clean up. However, on our block, all the down branches & debris have pretty much been cleaned up. Some homes’ awnings are gone; our next door neighbor’s window was shattered; & the glass front door of the house across the street was broken. But other than that, there seems to be no major damages on our block.

Down Trees in the Backyard

Now we’ll see what happens tonight, as heavy rain & thunderstorm are going to hit this area one more time. But I highly doubt that tornados will hit Brooklyn twice in a week, since they say the last tornado hit Brooklyn was back in 1889.

More on the Brooklyn tornado

New York Post:
– BROOKLYN CYCLONE

New York Times video:
– It showed our backyard. Fortunately, it was nothing compared to other neighbors’.

More photos on Flickr:
– Sunset Park, Bay Ridge, & Brooklyn in general