Photo By Sandy Owens | A rainbow on NAS JRB Fort Worth was captured prior to tornados ripping through the...... read more read more
NAS JRB Fort Worth, Texas (Dec. 29, 2022) —Tuesday Dec. 13 at approximately 8 a.m., two tornados ripped through Naval Air Station (NAS) Joint Reserve Base (JRB) Fort Worth. Multiple structures were impacted and damage to a hangar door, multiple facility roofs and windows, glass entry doors, cars, and trees was sustained. Miraculously, no injuries or casualties were reported.
According to Emergency Management Coordinator, Stephan Thrall, “the National Weather Service sent trained survey teams out to assess the storm damage. The meteorologist that conducted the survey, stated we had two EF-0 tornadoes with wind speeds of 75 MPH. One tornado occurred near the control tower, the other near the AAFES Exchange.”
The morning began with strong thunderstorms moving from the west to the east, as many of NAS JRB Fort Worth employees made their way into work. Stephanie Martin, Executive Assistant, witnessed first-hand the dramatic and sudden shift in weather as she made her way through the main gate entrance.
“Outside the front gate, the sun started to shine and there was even a beautiful rainbow, so I thought it was clearing up. Within a minute, as I was coming onto the base it all started to change. The sky turned black, the wind started blowing like crazy, tornado sirens were blaring, and the rain was coming down so hard it was difficult to see the road in front of me,” said Martin.
As Martin made it safely to work a co-worker who was driving in front of her asked if she noticed the weird cloud off to their right. She did not, but after checking her dash camera she saw a tornado! “I’m not sure how I missed it, but I’m very thankful I didn’t see it because I would have really panicked.”
“We were extremely fortunate there were no reported injuries or fatalities on the installation, and that damage was confined to a handful of facilities," explained Thrall. "Once the tornadoes passed, members across the installation began a damage assessment.”
The weather at NAS JRB Fort Worth can be volatile. Over the past two years the installation has endured Winter Storm Uri in 2021, a deep freeze in early 2022, extreme heat throughout the summer of 2022 and now tornadoes. A stark reminder to be prepared for any type of weather.
| Date Taken: | 12.29.2022 |
| Date Posted: | 12.29.2022 13:08 |
| Story ID: | 436058 |
| Location: | FORT WORTH, TEXAS, US |
| Web Views: | 240 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, 2 Confirmed Tornados Hit NAS JRB Fort Worth, by Sandy Owens, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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