VERO BEACH, Fla. – Mandy Reese was terrified when she realized a tornado was “closing in.” She swiftly grabbed her two kids and ran into the bathroom. She held on to one on each side and started to pray.
Chad Reese said they only had a 60-second warning, and he decided to stay outside. Once he had visual confirmation, he ran back inside his house. Ray Braham didn’t have a chance to see it or seek shelter.
“All of a sudden everything starts spinning around,” Braham said. “I was just standing in front of the door and just froze. I couldn’t move; I had never seen anything like that before.”
The Reese family and Braham were in Indian River County’s Vero Beach area. On Wednesday, Florida had tornadoes before Hurricane Milton landed and crossed the state.
A tornado passed through Vero Beach’s Central Beach, a neighborhood of about 16,800. Mac Sullivan lives in the area. He said he will never forget the twister.
“It was a real loud boom,” Sullivan said. “It was the loudest thing I’ve ever heard hit my roof.”
Vanessa Hamilton said she and her daughter were under a doorway. Danielle Ley said she found refuge in a bathroom when the tornado blew out a window in her daughter’s bedroom, ripped apart their family tree, and destroyed their cars.
The funnel-shaped cloud appeared to swallow wood, metal, glass, and concrete. It damaged Williams Preschool. Violently rotating winds turned over cars and mangled metal. Fallen trees blocked Cypress Road.
“The roadways are impassable. Beachland Boulevard is still very much covered in trees,” Indian River County Sheriff Eric Flowers said during a news conference on Thursday adding The Florida Forest Service was helping clear paths.
Avery Hamilton said visitors checking out the tornado’s damage should get out of their cars and stay to help the community.
“We are rebuilding our lives here,” Hamilton said.
There weren’t any deaths in the area, so despite the destruction and trauma, the Reese family was grateful.
“There is a lot of people that didn’t get as lucky as some of us, and that’s where it’s humbling,” Mandy Reese said. “Our hearts go out to those people.”
Vero Beach officials released a “tentative schedule” for solid waste services. Vero Beach police officers warned Friday that theft was subject to enhanced penalties during a state of emergency.
Some Floridians had yet to recover from Hurricane Helene when Milton landed as a Category 3 hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 120 mph, near Siesta Key, in Sarasota County, and crossed central Florida.
During a news conference, Gov. Ron DeSantis said he expects Milton’s death toll to continue to increase. Last checked, there were 16 dead.
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