CHAPIN, S.C. (WIS) - Homeowners in the Chapin Place subdivision shared scary reflections after their homes were damaged on Sunday by an EF-1 tornado.
According to the National Weather Service, the tornado started around 7:38 a.m. Sunday lasting around 10 minutes and spanning nearly 6 miles.
“I don’t think I have ever experienced something like that before,” said Elizabeth Epting, a mother of four.
Many homeowners said it was a short but scary experience.
The tornado made its way fairly quickly in and around certain parts of both the Chapin and Lake Murray areas.
Homeowners described the event as seconds of heavy rain and winds before the eerie skies cleared up.
Ernest Smallis moved to Chapin just two months ago. The tornado moved through his home tearing a six-inch hole in his roof and breaking his garage door.
“It was just these massive sheets of rain, and you could see the wind, it was carried in the wind but not just on the ground, it was everywhere!” said Smallis.
Smallis said if he ever has to experience a tornado again, he won’t wait and watch through the windows as long as he did this time.
Right across the street and in the same pathway Smallis said the tornado that ran through was the one at the Epting Family home. Epting this was unlike anything she had ever seen.
“Super super scary, it’s always loud when a storm comes, but this was different”, said Epting.
Epting’s home sits just behind a retention pond and next to a vacant property. She said it was the perfect place for the tornado to rip through taking some of her backyard with it.
“My stuff was down the street, my huge metal chairs all six of them were missing, everything was gone my babies water table, trash cans, basketball goal, everything was just gone. It was just all over the place. It was like it did a U from this way and pushed everything out this way and down the road,” said Epting.
Epting said she was shocked when she looked over the retention pond of her subdivision to find a home under construction with ladders and materials lying around, completely untouched. Meanwhile, looking back at Sunday’s events, she said she and her family feared the windows were going to crash in purely because of how loud the conditions of the tornado felt.
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