East Middle School in Joplin, Mo., was completed two years ago to serve the students in a growing city. A brand-new facility was part of a larger move by the district to create modern buildings to foster a better learning environment for kids in Joplin.
New surveillance video released by the school system shows the building took a direct hit from the massive EF5 tornado that tore through the city May 22, 2011.
Posted to the Joplin Globe's YouTube page, the nearly six minute video shows four views of the tornado's destruction.
The first view is of the inside of the commons area. On the edge of the screen you can see doors leading to the outside of the building, which is seen in another view later in the footage. It appears to be a quiet day as school was thankfully not in session on Sunday evening. There even appears to be brightness outside as there is no indication from this initial view that there is something wrong about to happen.
Lights began to flicker as power begins to fluctuate, probably due to power lines being whipped around outside. About 40 seconds into the footage, the brightness outside suddenly goes away. Lightning flashes can be seen on the floor, reflected from outside. Then debris flies inside, water rushes over the floor and benches that were stationary are moved several feet.
For a about 10 seconds, there is a lull in the wind and then suddenly the same debris that got blown into the commons area gets swirled around and almost sucked out as the tornado moves by. Then the full force of the winds are felt and the view ends.
The second view is of the main entrance, starting at 1:48 into the video. You see lighting outside and then a door has its glass blown out. Within 90 seconds, the ceiling gets ripped off and the camera falls down and dangles towards the floor. Even though it's about two hours until sunset, it is pitch black outside.
The auditorium was one of the hardest hit parts of the school. Again, the camera was mounted on the ceiling as it viewed the destruction around it.
The last view captures the twister's fury outside the school near the commons area that was viewed inside at the beginning of the video. Again, it starts out looking like a bright day with just a little rain at the 4:05 mark, but then the images turn for the worse. Lightning is seen in the distance and then it turns very dark. Metal is whipped around and you can sparks from power lines as the tornado wreaks its havoc on the school in the last part of the video.
You can also see video of what the damage looked like after the tornado had gone through. There is footage of the main entrance and the heavily damaged gymnasium.
If there had been students at the school, the tornado could have been much more tragic.
I'm still wondering when, and if, there will be footage from Joplin's traffic light cameras. There are traffic monitoring cameras throughout the city to monitor conditions on Joplin's roads. The camera system surely would have picked up some kind of storm damage in the city and could provide clues as to how cars would have swirled through the debris.
