Survivor Tells of EF-3 Tornado Burial in Nebraska

Marcia Nelson recounted how she miraculously survived an EF-3 tornado in Elkhorn, Nebraska after being buried alive under the rubble of her home. The storm struck on Friday during a deadly outbreak across America’s heartland. As the sky darkened and news reports warned of approaching severe weather, Nelson took shelter in her basement – although she admitted that this wasn’t always how she behaved when tornadoes hit their area. When flashes started to light up her home as she spoke on the phone with her daughter, she moved over towards a laundry room for some illumination from a flashlight or cellphone. “And then all of a sudden I could hear all this debris hitting my house,” Nelson said. She walked back towards her dryer and held onto it tightly as the wind forced its way into her home. The water heater came crashing down next to her, but somehow she remained unharmed – even when the main steel beam from her house landed nearby. Her daughter called again after their previous conversation was cut off, prompting Nelson to tell her that “it hit hard here”. She added: “I can see outside” before urging her daughter not to peer out of a window. Neighbours came by to check on her and found fire crews digging through the wreckage for nearly 20 minutes to rescue her. They lifted bricks, beams and chunks of debris as they worked tirelessly to free Nelson from beneath it all. “They helped me get out, and they had to lift me,” she recalled after being saved. In disbelief that she’d survived without injury, the 62-year-old admitted: “I just got it upgraded – I redid my kitchen which I wanted to do for a long time.” The home sheltered her safely for 34 years and protected her until its very last day. FOX Weather reporter Nicole Valdes asked Nelson whether she had started contemplating how she’d either rebuild or move on from the destruction wrought by the tornado, but she said: “No… that’s too overwhelming” adding with a hint of self-deprecation: “I don’t make decisions easily.” In the meantime, she and her friends have been digging through the debris looking for any sentimental items or photographs. Nelson acknowledged that it had reminded her how much other people in her community had helped each other out – saying it was heartening to see everyone coming together after such a devastating event.