'I've lost everything': Norman widow survives tornado but loses home of nearly 60 years

NORMAN — A glass candy jar sits intact atop a glass coffee table, the blue and yellow chocolate wrappers visible amid the insulation-covered rubble of Jean Hopkins’ home for the last 59 years.

The roof of much of the house is caved in, including over the 84-year-old’s recliner where she normally waits out storms. Instead, in an instance of what she called “divine intervention,” Hopkins took shelter in her bedroom closet as an EF2 tornado passed over her northeast Norman property in the 5900 block of E Alameda.

That bedroom, on the northeast corner of the house, was the only room where the ceiling still stands.

Related:Injury totals increase, one fatality reported after tornadoes strike Oklahoma

“God truly blessed me for that, because if you’ve seen my house, if I was sitting in the living room, I couldn’t have made it,” Hopkins said.

Hopkins is one of many Norman residents whose homes were devastated by the tornado –– many of whom told The Oklahoman they were taken by surprise.

Though the storm was forecasted days in advance, many said they didn’t get to their storm cellars or safe spaces because they thought they had more time.

“I’ve lost everything, but I am thankful, thankful that I’m here,” said Hopkins, tears welling in her eyes.

When the storms came

Sunday evening started like any other for Hopkins and her family — her two eldest daughters Teresa Elam, 64, and Karen Goodchild, 59, live next to and across the street from her — as Hopkins, Goodchild and her son, Paul, enjoyed a fruit salad together.

Not wanting her extra bananas to go to waste, she decided to make banana bread.

By the time it came out of the oven, Goodchild had gone across the street to milk her goats. Hopkins' phone rang, a call from the city of Norman warning residents to take shelter.

She made sure Goodchild got inside, and then she went back to icing her banana bread. She was listening to the news, hearing about the storm in Yukon, so she thought she was OK.

Then the power went out. Hopkins already has waning eyesight, so she quickly grabbed her flashlight.

“I made it to the bedroom, and it started hitting me,” she recalled. “I got sawdust all in my face, so I hurried to my closet. Then everything just went.”

Elam told The Oklahoman she couldn’t remember a time where her mother had taken shelter from a tornado.

Her only explanation for why she did that night is something she calls “God winks” — God and Hopkins' late husband, Paul, were looking out for her, Elam said.

As for Elam, she was next door having dinner with her son. They hunkered down in the hallway, along with their dogs, when the wind started to pick up.

“Is that a tornado?” Elam’s son asked her.

"No, it can’t be," she said.

“And we sat there in the house and it’s like, ‘Oh, my God,’” Elam said. “It sounds like a semi truck on a gravel road and I'm hung underneath it.”

How it happened so fast

No fewer than nine tornadoes struck Oklahoma on Sunday night, according to the National Weather Service. But one tornado alone touched down near the towns of Cole and Goldsby before leaving a path of damage that traveled through Norman, stretched between Newalla and Pink, and ended just south of McLoud.

“When the lights went out (and) my television went off, they said the tornado was in Yukon, Mustang, Newcastle …” Hopkins said, before shaking her head. “It was right here. I mean, it didn’t take any time.”

The rotation in those northern areas were separate from the tornado that hit Hopkins' home.

Forecasters with the National Weather Service in Norman said the agency “was pushing our severe storm and tornado warnings out further than we normally would,” in an attempt to give people extra time to prepare and find shelter.

Colder and windier conditions, combined with the heightened maximum speed of the jet stream above the region, resulted in a faster storm motion of between 60 to 70 mph and caused the tornadoes to form, according to weather service meteorologist Nolan Meister.

“In terms of pure forward speed, the storms Sunday night were moving very, very fast,” said Meister, who was out with survey teams assessing tornado damage Tuesday. “When something like that is moving that fast, it can be difficult for people’s perceptions of how close the threat actually is.”

Elam and Hopkins both said they walked away from the experience Sunday night with a “different level of respect” for tornadoes and the threat they pose.

“You cannot, cannot wait,” when you hear the tornado sirens, Hopkins said.

'This is her whole life'

It was tough for Hopkins and her family to see what little remained of the place they’d called home for so long.

The outer walls left standing of Hopkins’ home were largely stripped of their brick by the force of the tornado, revealing the original wood siding. The ceiling almost entirely had been swept away, and Elam said she was still searching, without success, for remnants of the roof in the area Monday afternoon.

What was once the 40x60-foot backyard barn had collapsed and blown apart, with only a windmill and a propane tank left recognizable amid the debris. A massive tree, whose branches had in years past held a tiny house of their own, was completely uprooted.

Since the devastating tornado strike, Hopkins stays inside Elam’s home next door as the family and supporters in the community weigh the damage to the property.

“I don’t know what’s going to happen yet,” Elam told The Oklahoman on Monday afternoon. “My mom doesn’t want to leave. I’m trying to get her to go to a hotel, but she and my dad built this. This is her dream. This is her whole life right here.”

At age 18, Jean Hopkins married 19-year-old Paul “Hoppy” Hopkins — a former member of the U.S. Air Force and engineer for the Federal Aviation Administration — in 1957 and remained married until his death in 2018. The two met while Paul was stationed in Jean’s hometown of Blytheville, Arkansas, where Hopkins has fond stories of sneaking down to Elvis’ Graceland mansion in Memphis, Tennessee, to get her picture taken on his front porch.

Paul and Jean Hopkins moved to the northeast Norman home in 1964 after selling all of their rental properties.

“We can build again,” Hopkins said. “It won’t be the same … I’m 83 years old, so starting over is not something I look forward to. But God must have a plan for me.”

The family continues searching through the rubble for anything that Hopkins owned that they could salvage. To their amazement, they’ve found a few items of sentimental value, including Paul Hopkins’ cowboy hat that Jean left hanging near the kitchen table.

“I’m going to wear this hat every time I ride my horse now, every day for the rest of my life, and then I’m going to pass it down,” Elam said. “But my mom couldn’t believe it. She just started crying.”

Family and friends also recovered unscathed portraits and photos of Paul and Jean Hopkins enjoying their younger days as members of the Thunderbird Square Dance Club.

“There’s always a silver lining,” Elam said. “Just a week ago, we were talking about that we needed to declutter. And guess what? We have been forced to do that.”

Neighbors offer their own perspectives

After it destroyed Hopkins' home, the tornado’s path led it straight through the home of 73-year-old Beverly Gray, her friend and neighbor, directly to the northeast on 60th Ave NE.

Gray, like Hopkins, was used to tornadic storms going anywhere but toward her. Dressed for sleep and watching the news, Gray went to bed when the power went out, thinking she’d fall asleep to the sounds of the wind and rain.

“My daughter called me and she said ‘Mom, Mom, are you OK?’ I said yeah. And she said, ‘Well, it's right there near your house,’” Gray recounted. “And right as she said that, you hear, just crash, like a gun. It was terrible.”

It was the sound of the roof over her garage and den caving in. Like Hopkins, the ceiling of Gray’s bedroom on the northeast wall of her home stayed intact while the rest of her roof was torn away.

Heading outside, Gray found two of her miniature horses, a 13-year-old gelding named Pepper and 8-year-old pregnant mare named Faith, with bad leg injuries.

“It was really hard, but I had to help them,” Gray said. “And the only way I could help them was to put them out of their pain.”

Gray’s neighbor to the north, Martin Murphy, said he and his family rode out the storm in their house, which sustained minimal damage. The home was built in 1938 and has been in the family for three generations, he said.

Their chickens and dogs survived, while their four outbuildings were destroyed.

Murphy, 51, said he’s just thankful his family is OK.

Savanah Murphy, his daughter-in-law, and her husband arrived at the house just before the tornado hit, planning to use the storm cellar. But there was no time, the two ran straight inside and the family hunkered down inside the bathroom until it passed.

“When I got out of the car … it was wind I've never felt before,” the 25-year-old said.

'So many good people out there'

Since the storm passed, Elam said her driveway has been full of friends and strangers alike looking to help.

The first to arrive were some storm chasers, who got her goats out from under debris while Elam went to help her mom out of her house.

When Hopkins called her Stillwater insurance agent Monday morning, Lucas Grounds, he immediately got dressed and drove her way. Elam said Grounds brought with him a $5,000 check and a determination to find mementos, important documents and help out however he could.

Monday afternoon, a man Hopkins had never met brought over his backhoe to bury the horse she lost in the storm, before moving a fallen tree from the gate blocking the path from Elam’s home to her mother’s.

“There's so many good people out there,” Hopkins said. “You don't see that every day, but maybe that's the reason that I'm still here. Maybe I needed to see that.”

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Norman widow loses house and barn in tornado but narrowly survives