AMAZING STORY
Tara Mitchell: Surviving A Monster Tornado
By Zsa Zsa Palagyi
The 700 Club
CBN.com-Tara Mitchell is a retired schoolteacher from Clinton, Mississippi, who always thought she had a good grasp on science and weather patterns. So it seemed almost routine when she and her son Mac stopped at a Wendy’s fast food restaurant in Yazoo City, to wait-out what they thought was ‘just another storm.’
Tara remembers, “We were looking out the windows and just noticed that the rain stopped and it got really dark. And we’re looking at the clouds and we just started to notice that the clouds started to rotate back. I mean it’s like the wind was blowing them past, but then they started to come back.”
So Tara, Mac, and all the other restaurant guests and employees made there way to the restroom to take shelter.
“As soon as we closed the door,” Tara says, “the lights went out and then there was a sound. It sounded like a canon. The next thing that happened was the ground started to shake like an earthquake. In my mind, you know my teacher mind, I’m thinking ‘This is not supposed to happen. I’m supposed to hear a roaring. I’m supposed to feel wind or pressure. This is like an earthquake!’”
By now, people were crying and trying to call out to their friends and family.
Tara wanted to help. “And I just thought, ‘What can I do? There’s got to be something I can do!’ And I just thought, ‘Pray and just thank God for what He hasn’t done yet.’”
So that’s exactly what Tara did. “I began to thank Him for His protection, that He created the storm, and that God was in control of the storm, and you know, if it was His will, it could pass. I knew that He promised in His word that it was not His will, it’s not God’s will that anyone should perish so to just give them a chance to call upon the Lord. And it was over right after I said that.”
Tara stepped out of the restroom first. She recalls, “The brick wall with the glass windows to the right of the restaurant was totally gone. All of the windows were gone. Chairs and tables, some of them were missing. The counter where you stand and place your order was not even in the restaurant. The ceiling tiles in the restaurant were, the ones that were not missing, were hanging so that you could see the sky. And there was glass everywhere.”
Weather officials later reported that the tornado on April 24, 2010 was on the ground for 149 miles. It lasted nearly three hours and reached a maximum width of 1.75 miles.
There were stories about the tornado all over the news. WLBT in Jackson, Mississippi featured their governor, Governor Haley Barber, saying, “It reminds me of Katrina.”
Newscasters also reported that there were official fatalities from the storm. But the tornado had not harmed a single person at Wendy’s.
“When I turned and looked back through the door into the restroom, the restroom was perfect,” Tara says. “There were no ceiling tiles out of place. There were no cracks in the walls. The door was still on the hinges and opened and closed fine. There’s no way anybody could survive this. There’s no way you could just walk away without even a scratch, and we did! I mean, that’s our God. I mean He just makes a way where you think none is possible. No matter what situation you’re in, He hears you, He sees you, and He’s standing there ready. He’s standing there ready to cup you in His Hands just like He did all of us!”
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