It is said that every cloud has a silver lining. For the Devine family, that hint of silver began to shine as they realized, despite the loss of their entire home and almost all of their material possessions being destroyed, their sweet family of five had made it through a historic EF4 tornado.
It was Friday, December 10, 2021. Ryan, his wife Allison, six year-old son Gavin, four year-old son Easton, and baby daughter Madelynn, who was just 9 months old at the time, had enjoyed a productive day outdoors. “We had been outside all day cleaning up the yard and had even used three tanks of gas trying to blow all of the leaves out of our yard,” Allison recalls. While the Devines say they knew storms had been forecasted, that was really nothing new, especially living out near Kentucky Lake.
“I am a big weather buff I guess you could say,” Ryan notes, as he recalls the conditions that day which he recognized as being favorable for severe storms. “I knew the potential and the dangers in the atmospheric pressure but, of course, the odds of it actually coming to your house are extremely rare.”
It was an evening like any other – the family had settled in for the evening as holiday movies played on the television and the spirit of Christmas floated in the air. After a special pizza delivery from family members, the couple recall hearing the sirens go off and looking out the door to check the conditions.
“I remember when they went off, we looked outside wondering what was going on,” Allison said. “We have three small children and so we don’t watch the news every night – we did not even realize how bad it was going to be.” After dinner, nightly chores went on as usual and the children were tucked snugly into their beds.
Allison recalls text messages and phone calls began to come in from friends and family members a short time later, “they were telling us the storm had turned and it was headed toward Moors.”
Turning on the news, Allison recalls seeing their street name pop up and it was at that time she said they both realized the situation was rapidly growing very serious. “We went and grabbed the kids,” Allison says she vividly remembers the moment where she looked down upon her baby girl sleeping peacefully in her bed. “I questioned myself for just a moment when my gut instinct just kicked in and said, ‘grab that baby girl!’”
Ryan managed to get the boys secured from their room and the family headed downstairs to a spare bedroom hiding under blankets and pillows. Within 10-12 minutes the storm hit and through a small window, Ryan said he could tell the atmospheric pressure was changing rapidly. “You could see a lot of lightning flashing, maybe 2-3 flashes every second.”
Allison noted, “it was eerily calm and quiet – we didn’t hear a freight train like a lot of people describe, but all of the sudden our ears popped, and you could not hear a thing.”
The family could not hear the sound of the second story of their home being ripped from the foundation. They could not hear their vehicles being crushed like soda cans or the sound of their tri-toon boat being torn to shreds. The only walls left standing were a few interior ones on the upper level and a couple partially surrounding the room where the family had taken cover.
“I worked for the Red Cross Disaster Center for years,” Allison said, recalling the moment she realized their house was no longer a home and they needed to get out immediately and flee to safety.
“I remember thinking I just need to save my family and we left everything. We walked barefoot over a mile with our kids on our backs navigating downed power lines, trees, and debris. Looking back, if you told me right now I had to go run that course again with a baby on my back, I probably could not do it – but in that moment I knew I had to do it for my family and for my kids.”
Photos of the devastation show just how deadly the EF4 tornado could have been had the Devines not followed their instincts to seek shelter – as the image reveals a child’s blanket suspended from electrical wires and the bed where they had just been tucked in is shown broken in pieces make this cloud’s silver lining shine a little brighter.
“I know we had angels in Heaven watching over us,” Allison says without doubt. “Our roof, the walls, most of the beds – all blown away but some of my most cherished keepsakes like my grandmother’s jewelry box and a blanket she quilted as well as Madelynn’s baptismal gown – I was able to somehow find them.”
Now in the recovery process for the past six months, the family is looking back and working to embrace the good with the bad, looking for the blessings among the tragedy.
“If you find yourself questioning humanity, don’t, because we have seen that there are truly great people in this world,” Allison said. “The community has been so great to our family” – but points out that the recovery process is much different for adults than it is for kids. “They still get frightened every time there is a storm and when they play with blocks or something similar, it is always a tornado that tears something down. Going through this as a couple would have been difficult, but having three small children has definitely been a challenge.”
Now in the process of rebuilding, the Devines say they are trying to remain positive and embrace the positive. “After 10 years together and having three children, then recovering from the scariest and worst days of our lives – we are doing something else that is really hard – building a home together. But every time we reach another milestone, we know we are one step closer to our forever home,” Allison said.
“I guess we have changed a lot through this process and our viewpoints have changed too. We have realized what’s most important in life and that you can always replace stuff but you cannot replace lives.”
And so, as it turns out, this is perhaps the most brilliantly colored silver lining to any cloud – the love of a family that can, together, overcome any storm.
