KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A sky-darkening storm was working its way into southwest Missouri around dinnertime on a Sunday evening, zeroing in on the city of Joplin.
Forecasters knew the storm’s potential was fierce and gave early warnings. Then, as storm sirens blared, one of the nation’s deadliest tornadoes hit — leveling a miles-long swath of Joplin on May 22, 2011. The storm was eventually blamed for 161 deaths.
Will Norton was among 400 graduates of Joplin High School emerging from their commencement ceremony. On the drive home, the 18-year-old was sucked out of his family’s SUV through the sunroof as his father desperately held onto his legs. Will’s body was found five days later in a pond.
Five years later, his father says it’s almost as if his son never left. Will’s room remains the way he left it.
“It’s a little comfort to go in there, go back in time and remember how it was,” Mark Norton said. “I go to the cemetery once or twice a week, but it’s not the same as being in his room.”
Joplin now has Will Norton Miracle Field, a baseball park for children with special needs. Freeman Hospital and its Ozark Center counseling arm has Will’s Place, a treatment site for children.
“Time passes, and you just look for the good in things,” Mark Norton says. “These are good things.”
The tornado threw Mark Lindquist more than half a block, burying him a pile of rubble. He was impaled on a piece of metal, broke every rib in his body and lost most of his teeth. He spent nearly two months in a coma.
Lindquist and a co-worker at the group home Community Group Services scrambled to place mattresses atop three men with Down syndrome as the twister bore down. Then they climbed on the makeshift cover for added weight.
“I do remember the house kind of exploding, and me being jerked in the air,” the 56-year-old said. “But that’s it.”
The residents he tried to save didn’t make it.
Lindquist was honored by the Missouri Legislature, though privately, he struggles.
Physically, “I’m a mess, but I’m still here,” he said. He no longer needs a cane but has a limp. He can fish, but can’t play his beloved golf. He plays catch with his 16-year-old son with his left hand, “but it’s not pretty.”
City bounces back
Joplin is recovering. Within a year of the tornado, the city’s population dropped 1.3 percent. But according to the latest U.S. Census Bureau figures, the current population, at nearly 52,000 residents, is higher than it was before the storm.
Mercy Hospital Joplin and the high school have been rebuilt, as have most of the roughly 500 damaged businesses.
Today, on the fifth anniversary of the storm, Gov. Jay Nixon will address the high school’s commencement ceremony and attend a public remembrance.
“In a way, they’re difficult,” Mark Norton said of past anniversaries. “But for us, it’s another year we got through. Every day, we wake up with the same pain as when it happened.”
