‘I was asleep with my doggies’: Woman wakes up to possible tornado damaging Redland home

MIAMI-DADE COUNTY, Fla. – A woman in the rural Redland area of southwest Miami-Dade woke up to a suspected tornado hitting her home early Wednesday morning as the outer rain bands of Hurricane Milton moved into South Florida.

Brenda Lee Newton, who lives on Southwest 344th Street just west of Florida City, described the unexpected 4 a.m. wake-up call.

“I was asleep with my doggies in the bed, my husband had just left for work and then all of a sudden I hear debris hitting the window, and I’m like ‘OK, this isn’t the storm yet,’” Newton said.

The strong storm pushed through overnight, toppling trees and damaging several properties.

“This is my husband’s family’s property and they’ve been here for years and it’s just sad to see it this way,” Newton said.

Newton showed Local 10 News the damage.

“When I went to open the kitchen door, I couldn’t because the tree fell over and I was like ‘great,’” she said. “And then I try to go out the front door and the same thing, all these trees were down.”

Seconds later, the power cut out. Newton received a tornado alert on her cellphone after the storm had already pushed through.

The strong winds twisted her front gate, destroyed her chicken coop, and damaged her fence, allowing her neighbor’s goats to get out.

Residents rushed to clean up with more stormy weather on the way.

“(I’m) shocked cause I’ve never seen this,” Newton said. “I mean, I’ve been through Andrew, but being alone and stuff, that was the scary part.”

Eric Hersteadt, who also lives in the area, had a tree fall on his property.

“We’re way more fortunate than what’s going on on the west coast,” he said. “So I don’t feel so bad.”

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