Home Care In Clarence, IA

MARION, Iowa — First written in 1987, one check may have taken a trip across Iowa Friday.

The sender? A tornado that touched down near Hedrick, Iowa, around 3:40 p.m.

Nancy and Clarence "Leroy" Sanders' farmhouse was destroyed as the storm barreled through the rural area — and the more-than-30-year-old check might have been blown away in the wind.

That's what Joe Swisher in Marion thinks, anyway.

Swisher found it in Linn County as the storms passed, meaning that slip of paper could have traveled around 95 miles this afternoon.

And Swisher wasn't the only one to stumble across something from the Sanders' house.

Five miles north of Mount Vernon, a couple found another check — this time from 1989.

"I know strange things happen with tornadoes and big winds and everything, but to think that it had gone that that far? I plugged it in on Google Maps, just to see how far it was between and it was about 70 miles," said Heather Innis, who found the check.

Kelly Bult in Cedar Rapids also stumbled across one of the Sanders' bank statements, nearly 90 miles away from the farmhouse.

"I brought it inside and it was wet. So, we put it on a piece of clean paper to try to dry it and unfold it as best we could," Bult said. "And I saw the name, and so I went back to our posts and I was like, 'I think that's the same name.'"

For Innis, the connections coming to light through these documents is one she'd never expect.

"It's a little astounding, and possibly a little scary, how much you can find on the internet to connect," Innis said.

To read more about the Sanders' situation and the damage Friday's storms caused, click here.

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CEDAR COUNTY, Iowa (KWQC) - Millions of Iowa crop acres were damaged in the Monday, Aug. 10 Derecho.

Early estimates from the state’s Secretary of Agriculture found roughly 14 million acres of insured crops were damaged, with the majority being corn fields.

Farmers still reeling with what happened, are also still picking up the damage to buildings.

Clean-up continued on Monday for farmers near Lowden and Clarence in Cedar County, a week after the storm.

“The horizon kind of changed. All your trees were flat. Several of your buildings were flat. Grain bins ruined. Then you look down the road and your neighbors place was the same way,” Brad Dircks said as he reflected on walking outside for the first time after the storm.

Dircks and his family farm about 1,250 acres of corn and soybeans in Cedar County.

"We had a beautiful crop coming until the storm."

Now, much of their corn fields are destroyed and several buildings on their property are gone, including grain bins. Dircks said damage to buildings is in the hundreds of thousands.

With grain bins gone, and as harvest approaches, storage is a concern.

“So many of the grain bins in the area are ruined and unuseable. And there’s not time to fix them. To compound the problem, a lot of the local elevators have the same issues with damaged grain bins, so they can’t take it either,” Dircks said.

A few miles to the West, the sight of destruction and crop damage continues.

“It just hits you in your heart and your stomach. It’s just like a pit there that everything you’ve worked with is gone in just ten or 15 minutes,” Jim Lawson, who owns a 600 acre farm just northwest of Clarence, said.

Damage to the Lawson farm is extensive. Although their house was mostly untouched, besides some siding and shingle damage, their barn, grain bins, shed and corn fields were heavily damaged.

“It’s gonna be tough for a while,” Lawson said, ”I’m not sure what exactly we’re going to do. I talked to my crop insurance adjuster. He may be going to let us till it under before too long. Some of it we’re going to have to try and get that’s still feasible to combine, but if it’s really flat, it’s not worth doing.”

The property has been in Jim Lawson’s family for nearly 150 years. His grandfather bought the land in the late 1870s. Not long after, a barn was built and stood on the property for almost as long.

“It was here from the beginning and something I played in as a kid,” Lawson said, “Just to see it gone, I wanted to try to keep it and keep it nice because so many farms don’t have barns anymore and that’s kind of the beginning of a farm you know.”

Although the destruction of the barn was one of the more difficult losses for Lawson, he said he and his wife will continue on.

“We’ll keep going. We’ll get things repaired. It’s just going to take some time and work,” Lawson said.

According to the Iowa Dept. of Agriculture and Land Stewardship, 36 counties were hit hardest with crop damage.

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JEWELL, Iowa —

A good Samaritan says his day was made when he saved a stranded couple along the side of a snow-covered road.

Storm chaser Clarence Smith ran into the pre-Christmas blizzard on Highway 69 near Jewell Friday morning.

“It's pretty intense right now. I don't know if you can see the telephone wire shaking like crazy,” Smith said as he narrated his live YouTube feed.

It was his first time chasing a blizzard, and that’s when he discovered a Webster City couple stuck in their car after it slid into the ditch.

“We had probably arrived five minutes after it happened. We are both very lucky they didn't hit one of us or anyone else,” Smith said.

An energy company worker was the first on the scene. The two first talked about what to do.

“You think we should even try pulling them out with all this weather?” the worker said.

The utility worker told Smith a couple in their 70s were on their way from Webster City to a doctor’s appointment in Ames. But the wind and snow were too powerful.

“That wind felt like it was going to take your legs out from under you,” Smith said.

The YouTube video shows Smith getting out of his truck. He and the utility worker decided to rescue the stranded driver and his wife and give them a ride since there was a tow ban in place. The wife was first.

“Thank you,” she said.

Then they go back to help her husband.

“They were glad that we were both there, and the shock of it was still wearing off a little bit for them to wrap their head around it all,” Smith said.

The rescuers drove the couple to a Casey's a few miles away, where the sheriff's deputy took over.

“I'm sure that's not anything less than a traumatic experience,” Smith said about the stranded couple.

Smith has been a storm chaser for decades. And he has one bit of good advice. Don't take chances.

“You can be here in Des Moines and have no idea a blizzard is going on, and you get a mile or two out of town, and it's just white-out conditions,” Smith said.