Tom Howe didn’t think much of this particular tornado warning. After all, he grew up in Iowa where such warnings are common, and he’d never experienced one before.

So on May 22 — only two weeks after Howe had moved to Joplin, Mo., to become the defensive line coach for Division II Missouri Southern State — the first-year coach paid little attention when a warning was issued.

But within a few minutes, he and defensive backs coach Kevin Almlie saw a funnel cloud outside Almlie’s apartment, about four miles in the distance. They took shelter. Howe, Almlie and Almlie’s girlfriend all huddled in the master bathroom of the apartment. They heard glass breaking and debris striking the house. The trio held onto the door to keep it from blowing off its hinges.

It was the first time Howe had ever been in a tornado. And the tornado he lived through turned out to be the seventh deadliest in United States’ history.

‘Any time you’re in a situation like that, you’re afraid,’ Howe said. ‘But you know it’s out of your hands at that point, and you just have to hope the worst didn’t happen to you.’

The worst didn’t happen to them.

After what felt like a minute, the tornado was gone, and they were alive. One-hundred-fifty-seven others in Joplin weren’t so lucky, losing their lives in the EF5 tornado.

***

Minutes after, the trio emerged from the bathroom and ventured outside.

‘There were people screaming because they were trapped in debris,’ Howe said. ‘We could see the hospital from where we were — before, you could never see it because of all the buildings that were once in the way. There were fires, the air smelled like gasoline and ammonia all night.’

Howe called defensive coordinator Mike Mutz immediately and told him they needed some help. Mutz had been in the north of town, where his home was hit with strong winds and hail but not affected by the tornado. He hopped in his car and drove to get them.

‘It was beyond anything I had ever seen,’ Mutz said.

And for three weeks after the tornado, football wasn’t on anyone’s mind. Instead, each day, the football staff would gather at 8 a.m. in the office and then get dropped off in the middle of wreckage to ‘try to start to help people,’ Howe said.

‘We lost a month of work. We did what we were supposed to do,’ Mutz said.

As the summer moved along, the coaches knew they had to prepare for the season. Missouri Southern has a program of community service for its football players — normally, Howe said, they might complete their community service just to get it done. But this year, players approached the coaches and asked how they could do more to help the community.

Once players reported for practice in August, they began the habit of sticking around after daylong workouts to go to whichever church or center needed their help, Mutz said.

Players would spend all day handing out food and water and helping with day-to-day operations at disbursement centers to help those affected by the tornado.

‘There was so much work to be done, games to get ready for. But you do what you have to do to help the community,’ Mutz said. ‘When you have 100 strong, young people wanting to help, you just wish you had more than 24 hours in a day to get more accomplished.’

***

Before the tornado, Howe wasn’t concentrated on the risks associated with living in the Midwest. Instead, he was concentrating on his new position at Missouri Southern.

He said he was enjoying life in Joplin, a ‘top Midwestern town’ with plenty to do and nice people. He was learning what to study, developing game plans and working on football recruiting — the activities of ‘any normal football team in the country.’

The tornado eliminated normal, and to this day Joplin is still trying to bring itself back.

The trees that lay in the three-quarter-mile swath of damaged land don’t have branches on them. Instead, leaves grow out of the trunks. The Walgreens in town is rebuilt and some buildings have seen minor repairs.

But 105 days after the tornado touched down, only the foundations of buildings remain.

So does the foundation of the football team. The Lions took the field this past Thursday at No. 15 Central Missouri, a team that made it to the quarterfinals of the Division II tournament last year. They lost 42-24, but Mutz said there were plenty of positive things he saw on the field.

‘We knew it would be a challenge going up to those folks, but football certainly helps you to get back to as normal as life can be,’ he said. ‘But still, it’s kind of selfish to talk about normalcy when two blocks away, life’s still not normal.’

The Lions’ home opener is Sept. 17. This year, that night game will be a little different than before.

‘There’s a feeling around the team that this seems a little bit more important,’ Howe said. ‘They’re looking to come back for a sense of normalcy. They look at it as an opportunity to do something exciting and special for the community.

‘I have the belief we could do some really, really special things this year. I can’t wait to watch them play, I’m excited for us. I’m excited for the city of Joplin.’

knmciner@syr.edu

Published on September 5, 2011 at 12:00 pm