Greensburg, Kan. – Police Officer Robert Tim Buckman was rushing to warn rural residents about the approaching storm when the tornado swept up his squad car and flung it 300 yards.
The 46-year-old officer hung on long enough for his daughter’s wedding at his hospital bedside, then died of his injuries Tuesday morning, his son Derick Buckman told The Associated Press.
“He died being a hero,” Derick Buckman said. “He was sworn to protect people, and that’s what he was doing the night he got picked up by a tornado.”
The tornado killed nine people in Greensburg as it obliterated the farming town Friday night, and it was blamed for another death outside town. It was classified as an enhanced F5 tornado, the most powerful level, and it stretched 1.7 miles wide with wind estimated near 205 mph.
Derick Buckman, a 25-year- old firefighter, said he talked with his father by phone Friday as the storm approached and asked whether help was needed for search-and-rescue efforts. His father was on his way to warn residents in two rural houses to get to safety.
“He said, ‘I don’t know yet, but if you can get here, get here. We’ll probably need you here first,”‘ Derick Buckman said.
As he drove, he tried to call his youngest son, who was staying with his grandparents in Great Bend.
“I’m guessing he just pushed a button on the phone,” Derick Buckman said. “The last words out of his mouth that anybody heard of him before he was found were ‘I can’t get away from it. It’s too big. I’m screwed.’ And then his phone and his police radio went dead.”
A passer-by noticed the crushed police car when a bolt of lightning illuminated it and stopped to help. The person heard Buckman groaning and called 911, Derick Buckman said.
“All I can tell you is the car was crushed like it was put in an actual crusher at a junkyard,” he said.
Before Buckman was removed from life support Tuesday morning, his 18-year-old daughter was married at his bedside, Derick Buckman said.
“He was there with his daughter to give her away,” he said.
Another son-in-law, Army Pfc. Seth Cole, had been scheduled to deploy for Iraq on Tuesday and said he was initially denied leave Monday. On Tuesday, his commanders at Fort Stewart, Ga., agreed to a delay so he could attend the funeral.
The rural residents Robert Buckman was trying to warn on Friday were unharmed, his son said.
