Possible tornadoes in Selma, Winchester leave nearly 40 injured, 100+ buildings damaged

WINCHESTER, Ind. — Possible tornadoes that ripped through Delaware and Randolph counties Thursday evening left dozens of residents injured and more than 100 structures damaged or destroyed.

Initial National Weather Service storm reports indicate damage to homes and trees in Selma — a small community just east of Muncie — around 7:39 p.m., with a possible tornado. By 8:03 p.m., severe wind damage was reported in nearby Winchester, with pictures, videos and reports indicating a tornado had moved through the area.

Weather Service crews were deployed to the area to assess the damage Friday morning, which will determine the storm’s strength.

But by sunrise, the scale of the destruction was already becoming clear: 38 people were reportedly injured, with three in critical condition. Over 4,000 people without power. More than 100 structures damaged, 22 homes completely destroyed.

Tornadoes in Indiana: What we know about damage in Winchester, Selma and Madison

At a Friday morning news conference, Winchester Mayor Bob McCoy expressed his astonishment that no lives had been lost.

“(We’re) very lucky,” McCoy said. “There’s houses that are leveled. Taco Bell, leveled. I really praise the Lord for this one because it could’ve been really bad.”

What we know about eastern Indiana storm damage

As the severe thunderstorm moved through Delaware County about 7:30 p.m. Thursday, funnel clouds were reported in the Royerton and Selma areas.

About 7:45 p.m., scanner traffic indicated there were "multiple injuries" in the area of Ind. 32 and Delaware County Road 600 East, where high winds had reportedly damaged vehicles.

At 8:12 p.m., scanner traffic indicated a tornado was "on the ground" in Hamilton Township.

In a release issued late Thursday night, the Delaware County Emergency Management Agency said the storm system "inflicted significant damage across various parts of the county," especially in the Selma area.

An initial assessment indicated as many as half of the structures in the town — of about 740 people, less than four miles east of the Muncie city limits along Ind. 32 — had been damaged.

Emergency responders arriving in the Selma area about 8:40 p.m. were advised the area was "a debris field.”

Trees ripped from ground, buildings leveled in Winchester

Entering Winchester shortly after sunrise on Friday on South Main Street — near Fountain Park Cemetery, where many of the community's founders are buried — it was evident how powerful the wind that moved through on Thursday night had been.

Dozens of trees — enormous, tall trees, likely decades old — had been brought down, in and near the cemetery. Debris was present, seemingly everywhere.

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A few blocks north of the cemetery on Main Street, a large tree had crashed onto a two-story home, demolishing its front side. Significant storm damage was also visible in an area more representative of Winchester's present rather than its past.

In the area near the Walmart Supercenter along East Greenville Pike, east of U.S. 27, a large Goodwill store was one of several buildings significantly damaged, with much of its roof and a large potion of its front wall gone.

Nearby, what had been a Taco Bell, adjacent to the Walmart parking lot, was completely demolished. The only indications a restaurant had stood there were a few elements of its drive-thru lane. A sport utility vehicle, on its roof, was within the rubble of what little remained of the restaurant.

Residents survey damage

As the Cross family drove through Winchester on Friday, a sense of gratitude gripped them as they saw the destruction they were spared from.

Homes had crumbled. Pink puffs of insulation were caught in tree branches. Pine trees snapped in half snarled against each other along the town’s cemetery, emanating their signature scent.

“I told my kids it smelled like Christmas,” said Marty Cross, who’s lived in the town for 58 years.

The Crosses were spared much of the damage, with the exception of a broken window and an uprooted pine tree in the back of grandma Judy Cross’ home.

Though they evaded the worst of the destruction, they felt the twister from inside their residences. From the green sky, as rain pelted, the eerie quiet just before the tornado touched ground and the roaring akin to a freight train lasting several minutes.

With a flashing emergency lights and strewn power lines around her, Ellie Rohrer and her siblings scavenged a pile of objects along Greenville Pike.

The pile, made up of books, rubble, baby dolls and various papers, is all that’s left of her grandmother’s house. Much of the structure had been swept to the other side of the road. The family got a call from the grandmother, who phoned for help because she was stuck under a wall. Rohrer, her brothers and friends came to the rescue and lifted the wall pinning her to the ground, she said.

She was taken to a hospital in Richmond with a concussion, they said. As she was being treated, her grandchildren tried to salvage what they could, fearing looters might come for the wreckage. “My grandma is the matriarch who tends to write everything down,” Rohrer said.

Emergency shelter, reunification center established

The American Red Cross has established an emergency shelter at Winchester High School, at 700 N. Union St., in Randolph County. In Selma, a "reunification center" has been set up at nearby Wapahani High School, at 10401 E. Delaware County Road 167 South, to provide "assistance and support" to residents displaced by storm damage or who became separated from family members.

Financial donations to help those affected will be managed by the Community Foundation of Randolph County, McCoy said.

Indiana Task Force 1 crews were deployed and arrived early Friday morning to help with search and rescue efforts. More resources will be made available at the state and federal levels, Gov. Eric Holcomb said, and he expected even more help would come from neighbors throughout the area.

“You’ll quickly learn, as I have over the years, that your family here, this community, has just gotten a lot larger. It’s gone statewide,” Holcomb said.

He applauded the state and local first responders and volunteers who immediately turned to search, rescue and cleanup efforts to “address nature’s wrath.”

“I think the only thing more powerful than that wrath is our Hoosier spirit and that spirit of teamwork,” Holcomb said.

This story is breaking and will be updated.

This article originally appeared on Lafayette Journal & Courier: Possible Indiana tornadoes leave 3 critical, dozens more injured