The F5 twister that upstaged the Oklahoma ceremony.

Two signal events provided the drama in my Oklahoma hometown on Monday night, May 3, 1999.  One was an awards ceremony at Midwest City High School where six of us alums were being inducted onto the school’s Wall of Fame.

I was about to be honored at an awards ceremony, but a tornado had other ideas.

The other was the tornado.

The first ceremony would have been one to remember — if it had  actually taken place. But it was blown away by the second event: the one that still raises goosebumps when I recall it.

A howling evening

Left in the wake of this massive twister was a city devoid of electrical power but loaded with storm debris. Some of it landed very close to where the 300 of us were huddled at the high school.

Mom, C.J., me, and Dad before the ceremony.

Although located in the center of a geographical strip known as Tornado Alley, Midwest City had not suffered a serious tornado in 50 years until that night.

For those of us gathered at Midwest City High School, the school’s jazz band was just finding its groove, old friends were embracing, and the fun was just beginning when Principal Rick Bachman took to the lectern in the cafeteria. His calm voice belied his concern when he made what seemed a strange announcement.

“Our great band reminds us of the music played by the ensemble aboard the Titanic, but we don’t want to be like the passengers on that ship, so let’s quietly and orderly leave this building and walk over to the field house,” Bachman said.

Excuse me?

At table after table, smiles dissolved into quizzical looks. Bachman went on.

“We have just received word that a tornado has been spotted on the city’s west side, so just to be safe, let’s move on to the field house.”

Most of the 300 did exactly as Bachman asked.

As we walked, I was chatting with Mom and Dad about how this wasn’t a total surprise for us.

That storm?

“This must be that same twister that started up down in Chickasha an hour ago, and was headed north,” I said. “Remember how the weatherman said it was one of the biggest the state has seen? But Chickasha is about 35 miles south of here.”

Dad replied, “Right. Tornados usually stay on the ground only a few minutes at any one time. How could that funnel still be touching ground an hour later?”

In this case, it did. This was the same storm.

In the field house, some mingled in the hallways, others took seats. A few moments later, the court was lit, and a few hundred spilled out into it. Some students found a basketball and began shooting hoops.

“This is pretty eerie,” one teacher said. “It’s like we’re in a bomb shelter waiting for the blast.”

Watching it come

Many huddled around a television featuring a live account and video of the approaching tornado. Midwest City and the adjacent Tinker Air Force Base were in its sights.

“Oh my God,” uttered one parent who had shown up to see a friend’s daughter honored. The sentiment was repeated several times as you passed through the huddled masses.

“Fifty years and no real tornados; now this,” another woman whispered to her husband.

My sister C.J., who came to see me be inducted in the ceremony, appeared in the locker room with a chunk of hail the size of a tennis ball.

“Just for your information,” she said, “this is what it’s doing outside.”

Taking cover

At that moment, the television blurted out the news.

“Residents of Midwest City should take cover immediately! This tornado is headed straight for the downtown area.”

Hearts sank.

Out on the basketball court, school officials made the announcement.

“Everyone must leave the court and move to the hallways or underground locker rooms. The twister will be here in a couple minutes.”

There was no panic among the hundreds huddled together. Only the dread of what was coming. You don’t grow up in Oklahoma without getting used to this dance every spring.

Some embraced loved ones; others held hands; many just waited and stared into the blackness.

“Midwest City, take cover. Tinker Field, take cover,” the radio said again. We listened from the locker room as the storm winds howled above us. We waited for what seemed the inevitable, and I realized my parents’ home was between us and the twister. I was glad they were with me at the school, because their home would be hit before it swept over us.

A lot of sparks

Our eyes were glued to the TV, watching the tornado approach us, creating electric sparks, pops, and flashes as it took down power transformers on telephone pools in its track toward Midwest City. Then suddenly, the TV screen went dark and, a second later, the locker room was plunged into darkness, too.  The storm had taken out the power lines. A few people had transistor radios and turned them on.

Over those radios came another message.

Changing direction

“Wait a minute,” the announcer said, “the funnel seems to be making a left turn, going north toward Oklahoma City. It is missing Tinker.”

In the darkness, hearts were buoyed.

“It now seems headed north between Air Depot and Sooner Road,” the radio voice continued. If that was true, it would miss us at the high school by a few blocks.

“Pray for Del City,” one voice said in the dark, referencing the adjacent town that began at Sooner Road.

Although the twister would miss our street, it did wind up venting its fury on Midwest City’s west side, as well as Del City.

A new worry

As word of the storm’s new path filtered through the crowd, a new worry began. A strong odor of natural gas began to fill the field house so, once again, we were all evacuated to the main school building. But once outside, the feeling of relief spread through the crowd as the danger seemed over for us. Most headed not back to the school but to their cars for a drive home to assess wind and hail damage.

A drive through the city’s traffic-congested west side showed downed power lines, especially along Air Depot, lost power across most of the city, and limited or no phone service. Debris, probably blown from the west and the funnel track, littered the city’s west side. Many cars were showing the hailstone damage.

A bullet dodged

The next day we all realized how lucky we had been at that high school ceremony. The twister was officially labeled the Bridge Creek/Moore Tornado, measured as an F5 tornado, the most powerful grade a twister is given.

In fact, meteorologists said it registered the highest wind speeds ever measured globally, with winds recorded at 301 mph. It was the strongest tornado ever recorded in the Oklahoma City metro area. It had covered a path of 38 miles from its point of touchdown, staying on the ground for 85 minutes.

The death toll from the tornado was 41, with many others injured. More than 8,000 homes were destroyed, as was much of the city of Moore located just south of Midwest City, and loss damages topped $1 billion.

It was the first storm to ever use the tornado emergency tracking system of the National Weather Service, whose severe storm headquarters is located 20 minutes south of Midwest City in Norman.

The ceremony comes home

Oh, and that ceremony I had come home for?  I got my gold watch in the mail a week later, back in my Memphis home.

That was fine with me.

Jim Willis
I am a writer, college professor, and author of several nonfiction books, including three on the decade of the 1960s. Several wonderful essays of gifted Retrospect authors appear in my book, "Daily Life in the 1960s."