Off-Duty EMT Caught in Tornado—In His Car
June 02--OKLAHOMA CITY -- Josh Conrad knew he wouldn't be able to escape the tornado approaching him as he sat in his car at the dead end of an Oklahoma County road Friday evening.
Like others in the Oklahoma City area, the off-duty EMT knew that a violent storm that could produce tornadoes was headed his way.
Conrad, an EMT for the Emergency Medical Services Authority in Oklahoma City, said he "was doing what people shouldn't do" during a tornado warning: driving. He said he wanted to make it to a relative's home to make sure she was OK.
When he got close to his relative's house, "I found out she had left and I just started heading south. That was right when the storm decided to switch and go south," said Conrad, 30.
Traffic on Interstate 240 and elsewhere in the area was congested with cars, some fleeing the storm or checking on relatives like Conrad was. Torrents of rain reduced visibility, causing several accidents around Conrad, he said.
Cars were at a standstill on the highway so Conrad exited and continued driving until the road came to a dead end at a field. Across the field, he saw the tornado's debris cloud coming toward him.
Conrad knew he was likely to be injured or killed sitting in his car, so he got out and ran.
"Training took over at that point and I went into action mode. I just needed to get away from my car and there were a lot of trees around me. ... I knew I had time to run."
Conrad later learned he had sprinted for a mile.
He dived into a deep, narrow ditch filled with water in a pasture, his head barely below ground level and facing the storm. He tried to keep his cell phone out of the water and underneath his coat.
"I was there a little over an hour. I was receiving texts telling me where the tornado was," he said.
"It went over the top of me. It was very surreal. I couldn't hear anything but wind. ... There was some debris flying and it got very calm.
"I looked up and saw the sky and I guess I was in the center of the tornado because it happened with the wind again."
Rather than worrying about his own safety, Conrad was praying that his 4-year-old daughter and her mother were safe. They had also left in a car headed south and were likely in the path of the storm, said Conrad, who later learned they were safe.
After the tornado passed, Conrad received a text that three tornadoes were reported in the area where he was taking cover in a ditch. Wind uprooted a large tree 20 feet away and hail pelted him in the ditch.
"At that point I realized I couldn't do it again so I got up and started running," he said.
Conrad made it to a nearby farm, where he stumbled on a cellar door and pounded on it. The rancher and his family and neighbors huddled inside "opened it and almost pulled me in."
"I was able to ride out the rest of it in there," he said.
The rancher gave Conrad a ride back to his car when the storm had passed. Conrad said he only got the couple's first names in the chaos but plans to return to thank them.
"When I went to pick it (his car) up it was about 30 feet away from where it had been near the tree line," he said.
Conrad said though the car was "completely untouched" when it was moved by the tornado, he knows he could have been injured had he stayed.
"A tornado turns your car into a weapon," said Conrad, who returned to work Saturday. He has worked as an EMT with EMSA about a year and wants people to know they should stay out of their cars in a storm capable of producing tornadoes.
"I've heard and been trained if there's a tornado, you get as low as you can, find a ditch. ... I came away from that with a bruise on my shoulder."
Oklahoma Highway Patrol Capt. George Brown said whenever a storm is approaching, people are safest in an underground shelter or their homes instead of a car. Authorities do not know for sure whether any of those who died Friday were fleeing the storm.
"We think with the recent Moore tornado carnage that people were like, 'I'm getting the heck out of here.' I can't say that I blame them for thinking that way, but the worst place you can be is in your car or a mobile home."
Brown said troopers were busy Friday responding to many reports of stranded motorists during the storm but also trying to clear the highways for emergency vehicles.
"I spoke with the troop commander over at Troop A ... and he said they had people fleeing their homes into the interstate system" from the storm. "They also had that combined with the rush hour traffic as well as onlookers. Those three things gridlocked the Oklahoma City interstate system which was obviously a problem when we were trying to get emergency vehicles through."
EMSA spokeswoman Lara O'Leary said 39 people were transported due to injuries from the storm. O'Leary said four of the patients were transported by another ambulance service from an area near Interstate 40 and Banner Road and the remainder from the Oklahoma City area.
The storm flipped six tractor-trailers near a weigh station along I-40 between Yukon and El Reno, authorities said.
O'Leary said between 5 p.m. and 11 p.m. Friday, EMSA received 279 calls. She said many people did not require transport, though 35 were ultimately transported.
Massive amounts of rainfall flooded the streets, stranding motorists and making travel even more difficult, she said. Emergency vehicles had an additional challenge getting to the calls due to the flooding and gridlock, O'Leary said.
"We had plenty of warning. The weathermen were telling us for hours that this was going to be a tornadic day and that it was going to be a potentially violent day," she said.
Ziva Branstetter 918-581-8306
ziva.branstetter@tulsaworld.com
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