Word: springfield
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...outskirts of Jerome, a small town of 1,800 tucked just southwest of Springfield and perhaps the hardest hit in the area, signs were scrawled on the windows of the Shop 'n Save telling residents the store was open. But while the grocery store was spared, the damage wreaked by the weekend storms that hit most directly here late Sunday was clear. An Oldsmobile Cutlass, its windows shattered, was somehow lifted and plopped back down on the rack of shopping carts outside the store...
...just unbelievable," said Jerome police officer Butch Tuxhorn, who estimated that 80% of the town's homes suffered some damage. Driving the streets around Springfield, traffic was jammed as police shut down major streets here to make way for the tow and electrical trucks, the diggers and the emergency equipment that scattered across the city to begin shoving aside nature's litter. Some of the capitol building's windows were blown out and other government buildings suffered some damage...
...business districts. On one block, part of a house had crashed down on a truck. On another, the trees on either side had collapsed into the middle, creating an impassible stretch. Power cables dangled and stretched across streets like clotheslines. A local bar owned by the brother of Springfield's mayor was turned into a convertible, its roof swept away, but beer signs still hung on walls that remained standing-a telling sign of nature's seeming illogic...
...Bunyan head from the statue outside the Lauterbach auto shop was missing. Buses, mobile homes, pontoon boats, delivery trucks - all tipped on their side, thrown like toys. "We're taking our trucks, everything we got, to do what we can to pick up trees, whatever," said Steve Ferrier, a Springfield water department employee. "I'm 34, and I've just never seen anything like this. It has just devastated the city...
...dozen people were injured, and it was no less tragic for the families who stood on the wrecked streets staring at homes and memories that vanished in a violent spasm of storms and tornadoes that first touched down about 7:20 p.m. Sunday roughly 60 miles southwest of Springfield and hit the capital an hour later...