Barron County residents will gather Wednesday night for an unusual anniversary party.
Though it includes free food and marks a major life event, this gathering is intended to remember a day that quite literally shook the lives of many folks who live in the Chetek area — the EF3 tornado that roared through Barron, Polk, Rusk and Price counties on May 16, 2017.
The tornado, which generated wind speeds estimated at up to 140 mph and set a Wisconsin record with a path of 83 miles, damaged more than 150 properties and caused over $10 million in damage in Barron County alone.
Prairie Lake Estates, a mobile home park just north of Chetek, was ground zero for the storm. That’s where the storm’s only fatality, 45-year-old Eric Gavin, was in his home when the storm hit.
As a reporter who arrived at the park about an hour after the tornado struck, I agree with Barron County Sheriff Chris Fitzgerald when he says it’s a miracle more people weren’t killed. It was undoubtedly one of the most horrific scenes I’ve ever seen in person.
The storm, which struck around supper time, destroyed about 40 of the park’s 58 mobile homes, with many of them broken into chunks of siding, insulation and rubble scattered for miles by the wind. The center of the park was a mass of debris, with not a single trailer left standing.
Traumatized survivors described huddling in bathrooms or under tables and watching their houses come apart around them, with shards of glass flying at them like bullets.
Digging out
But beginning that very night, evidence of an important part of the story began to emerge, as neighbors helped each other and volunteers and emergency personnel rallied around storm victims to help them begin the long process of recovery. A hundred first responders reported to Prairie Lake Estates within an hour of the tornado.
“It was like nothing I’ve ever been a part of in my life and nothing I ever hope to be part of again,” Fitzgerald said. “But it has been awesome to see the friendships formed and all of the community support. Without everybody working to make this happen, we would never have been in the position we are now.”
That position, he said, is pretty positive considering the degree of devastation that occurred just a year ago. Though tree cleanup and roof repairs are continuing in the region, all of the displaced residents have found housing, thanks to volunteers on a long-term recovery committee — including raising more than $1 million for tornado victims thanks in large part to a matching grant from Rice Lake native and philanthropist Foster Friess.
Work is scheduled to begin soon on a playground at Prairie Lake Estates, and officials are hopeful that a Federal Emergency Management Agency grant will be approved this summer to build a storm shelter at the site as well.
Those projects should provide a much-needed boost to the mobile home park, which has struggled to rebound from the storm. Though officials recognize the affordable housing option is needed in the county, people have been slow to return to the facility.
Work remains
Prairie Lake Estates now has 14 private owners and four families living in rental trailers — a far cry from the 58 who were there a year ago — and the area hit hardest by the tornado remains a mostly empty field, said Darrin Seever, the son of park owner Elvina Gagnen.
“It’s been hard, but we’re making lots of progress. It’s happening,” Seever said, noting that park officials continue to work on planting trees, landscaping, replacing damaged utilities.
He called the tornado heartbreaking for its impact on residents and the business and said the owners are considering transforming part of the site into a campground for seasonal visitors to help bring in some revenue.
“It took Mom 17 years to get the park in the shape it was before the tornado, and it’s a lot of expense to start all over again,” he said. “We just want to make it beautiful again.”
The region’s overall recovery, however, has been remarkable, said local business owner Darryl Dahl, vice president of the Chetek Area Chamber of Commerce and the guy who coordinated relief efforts by hundreds of volunteers who converged on Chetek from across Wisconsin and the Upper Midwest in the weeks after the tornado.
Dahl said resorts damaged by the storm are all back up and running, and Chetek’s successful hosting of the annual Governor’s Fishing Opener last weekend was a symbol of the area’s comeback.
“The sheer manpower of volunteers we had last year is the reason it is how it is,” Dahl said. “Thanks to all of that help, I would say by and large the Chetek community is pretty much back to normal.”
On the anniversary of a frightful disaster, that’s something worth celebrating.
by Eric Lindquist (2018, May 12) Leader-Telegram
