Lady Lake, Fla. – Pulling blue tarps over the houses that still had walls, neighbors, inmates and National Guard troops worked in the rain Saturday to help residents begin recovering from tornadoes that chewed through central Florida, killing at least 20 people.
The victims from the second-deadliest series of tornadoes in state history ranged from a 92-year-old man to 17-year-old Brittany May, killed by a falling tree that crushed her bedroom.
President Bush designated four central Florida counties as disaster areas, releasing millions of dollars in aid for recovery and individual assistance.
“It makes you sick to your stomach for what we saw,” David Paulison, director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, said after touring the area Saturday morning with Gov. Charlie Crist.
Forecasters said Saturday that at least three tornadoes, with winds possibly as high as 165 mph, hit between 3 and 4 a.m. Friday, when few people were awake to hear tornado warnings on radio and TV.
The cleanup task was daunting Saturday as showers soaked roofless homes and piles of twisted aluminum siding, bricks, belongings, tree limbs and lumber.
Power lines were down and traffic signals out in many areas.
Neighbors helped Sherry Reeves, 48, sort through her belongings and patch a hole in her roof. Reeves was amazed that her home wasn’t leveled like hundreds of others in this area about 50 miles north of Orlando.
“The good Lord slipped and missed, or luck of the draw,” she said.
The governor, handling the first natural disaster since he took office, said some stricken areas looked like “the surface of the moon.” Crist canceled plans to attend today’s Super Bowl in Miami to stay in central Florida.
At least eight trailers with emergency supplies had arrived in the Orlando area Saturday afternoon, and more were to follow, said FEMA spokeswoman Alexandra Kirin late Saturday.
A total damage estimate has not yet been tallied, but the Volusia County Property Appraisers Office on Friday put a preliminary damage estimate at $80 million and said as many as 500 properties were damaged by the storms.
On Saturday, Lake County officials also released a preliminary estimate, of $10 million in damage to more than 100 homes.
