JOINT BASE LANGLEY-EUSTIS, Va. –
"The wind started to pick up, so I closed the door. When I opened the door again it was a mess out there. It tore up people's houses. I walked around to where a trailer was...it was no longer, nor was my friends trailer...I lost a few of my friends," said Sheila Jones, Waverly resident.
On Feb. 26, 2016, 20 U.S. Air Force Airmen volunteers from Langley Air Force Base, Virginia, drove an hour west to Waverly, Virginia, to help clean-up the city ravaged by a tornado just two days prior.
The enhanced fujita scale-one tornado's 110 miles per hour winds destroyed homes, local businesses, flipped cars, knocked over trees, caused three fatalities and injured others.
"It's devastating, I don't know what I would do in this situation seeing my home torn to pieces or seeing my community in pain from losing members," said Senior Airman Shelby Yeaples, 633rd Communications Squadron knowledge management specialist. "[Waverly] are our family and our family is hurting [helping] is something we need to do, if something was to happen in Hampton we would hope that people would come and help us too."
The Airmen, in collaboration with 200 volunteers from surrounding cities, the Red Cross and Operation Blessing, gathered at a vacant grocery store that acted as a tornado relief zone, collecting donations of food, water, blankets and clothing items for the town residents.
Throughout the morning, the Waverly residents expressed gratitude to the Airmen and other volunteers who came to help.
"People are coming to help us, just like we would come help them," said Jones. "Everyone is trying to pull together. That's what you're supposed to do, pull together and help one another."
Jones said as the Airmen cleared wreckage from homes and local businesses and sifted through broken pieces of personal belongings, pulling memories out of debris, the locals and military members working side-by-the-side inspired hope.
"[Waverly] is a family, one big family" said Jones, who lost friends in the tornado attack. "May take a little work, but we will do it, put it back to what it was."
As the day drew on, the Airmen and residents shifted their efforts to cleaning up the Waverly Cemetery. The volunteers lifted toppled headstones, cleared knocked over trees and picked up debris throughout the cemetery.