What to do if you find personal affects dropped by the storms.

[dixiegrrrrl]

Last night, people in Birmingham were reporting they were finding papers, pictures, even license plates, from
Tuscaloosa, dropped by the storm.
A few minutes ago I heard from a DUer in Tenn. who has found papers ( one man found a wallet) from a town here in Al.

The procedure is to turn it over to your local police, if the location of the item can be identified.
The police's job is to contact the authorities in the town where the item belongs.

So very many people have lost everything, having even a picture returned to them would mean so much.

Anybody here found anything from the storms?????

[annabanana]

1. Big k&r. I hope that as much as can be restored to those so

affected,be restored.

What a wrenching thing it must be.

[dixiegrrrrl]

3. And how hard to replace all those precious memories.

Not to mention vital papers.

[aquart]

2. My experience is that the finders will do their utmost to return the items.

Especially since they feel so helpless otherwise in the face of such disaster.

[tnlefty]

4. I was in tears earlier today when I was picking up debris from

my yard, as I realized I was picking up pieces of people's homes that are probably destroyed.

I found: pieces of wallpaper, linoleum without the subfloor, either tiles or linoleum that looks like tile with the subfloor attached, something blue that looks like it could be part of a countertop, a twisted up piece of a McCall's sewing pattern that I had to gently unwind to determine what it was, pattern number 3696.

Strangest of all, I found a single tattered sheet from someone's address book and the listing appears to be for Wilson's Funeral Home in Ft. Payne, AL. The first 2 digits of the area code are gone but the number reads 6-845-9150. I mentioned this to my husband around 2 this aqfternoon. He called me approx. 3 hrs. ago and he'd come in contact with 4 people in Bradley County, TN who had found items in their yards from Ft. Payne. An older gent showed my husband a wallet with a driver's license with a Ft. Payne, AL address.

For years folks from Scottsboro and Ft. Payne have driven into Chattanooga to work. We're scratching our heads trying to figure out if people stayed somewhere around here thinking they'd be safer than the nasty that was blowing through AL then hit here, or why we're finding these things.

I was going to toss it earlier, but then I decided that I need to keep what I have in a box when it dries out. The paper stuff I'll put in a plastic bag and I'll keep it all together.

[uppityperson]

5. awww, no words. :(

[tnlefty]

13. I don't consider myself a weepy person, some around me consider me

the b word, code for an assertive female, but I wasn't the only one in my family affected, the guys were quiet as we were finding these items, and they realized it could've been us, but it wasn't, and we were finding parts of people's homes/lives in our back yard.

A sobering experience to say the least.

[tnlefty]

15. My spouse just walked in from another long day at

work trying to restore power around here and he told me that he tuned into local talk radio (which I've refused to do for about 6 yrs. as it's all shit AFIC, wgow 102.3) and he stated that people were calling in talking about items they'd found from AL.

I won't go looking for audio, nor transcripts, as I despise local talk radio here.

[jillan]

6. How wonderful you are going to keep the papers. My heart aches for what you all are going thru.

[CoffeeCat]

7. How far are you from Ft. Payne?

It sounds like you are quite far from Ft. Payne. It would be interesting to know how far
the storm carried those items. It is so sad. I'm glad that you're keeping those things. People
will be so grateful to get anything returned to them. Especially the wallet that the man has.

When disasters happen and people have lost everything--getting something back would mean so much.
The item that is returned might not be significant--but just knowing that someone cared about them,
enough to do a kind deed and think of them--I'm sure would mean a lot.

This is a nice thread, amid a terrible ordeal. People on DU have such kind hearts to express
concern and compassion.

[tnlefty]

10. According to mapquest

1 hr. and 25 mins. or 74.09 miles, but I'm well outside of Chattanooga where folks from Ft. Payne and Scottsboro drive to work.

We're seriously wondering if someone(s) from Ft. Payne who works in Chattanooga or nearby is what we're finding or if this blew in from the tornado that hit Tuscaloosa, then Ringgod, GA, then Apison, TN, then Bradley Co., TN, as that monster was tracking toward Sand Mtn., AL, which would have included Ft. Payne, and Scottsboro. I saw a fellow from Morristown, TN (where our weather radio blasts from) in a press conference on the local news around 5 today, and that monster was the same in 3 states, and even when it went through TN it was still a mile wide and traveling at approx. 55 mph. He stated it was as EF4.

I'm just distressed that I'm finding parts of people's houses/lives in my yard. I'm in tears, and want to throw up at times.

[Kurovski]

8. K&R. (nt)

[malaise]

9. That's very thoughtful

:yourock:

sp

[dixiegrrrrl]

11. I lost a house to wind damage during a hurricane.

Fortunately, some of my "stuff" was salvageable.

The people who have lost everything will be haunted for years.
A lot of these communities have been home to 3.4, or more generations of the same family, so they have lost the past and the future of their lives. Everything that had meaning to their world is gone.
Unbearable, no matter what part of the world one lives in.

[OneGrassRoot]

20. So well said, dixiegrrrl....

:cry:

I just found out that the last of my Alabama relatives has been accounted for. I'm just outside of Raleigh, where tornadoes blew through two weeks ago.

Everything is gone in an instant. You're right: the past and future.

So poignant...:cry:

[dixiegrrrrl]

22. This picture from yesterday made me cry.

The look on that woman's face and the fact that a young man ( no relation to her) is
being there for her.

[OneGrassRoot]

25. ...

:cry:

:grouphug:

[treehuggnlibrul]

12. There's also a Facbook page for posting photos/docs

The page name is "Pictures and Documents found after the April 27, 2011 Tornadoes". There's also a facebook page for animals that have been found after the storm....

[dixiegrrrrl]

14. Thank you for that info ...what a great idea!

Does one have to have a Facebook account to see the page?

[tnlefty]

16. Oh, and just for the record, I saw some male dipshit on

the weather channel trying to downplay what has happened here with the 'people in the south would downplay the categorization of tornado alley as being in the midwest when tornadoes have been in the south for the past 20 yrs'.

20 yrs. ago I was a 30 something and it wasn't as bad as it has been, why not back up yrs. ago when I was a child and this crap wasn't happening? Dipshit.

[proud2BlibKansan]

17. My friend found a drivers license in her front yard after a tornado 200 miles away

She called the cops in the town where the tornado had hit and mailed the license to them. A few weeks alter, she got a thank you card from the guy the license belonged to. His house had been obliterated by the tornado. Here's the weird part - his license was IN HIS WALLET on his dresser. They never found the wallet.

[dixiegrrrrl]

18. speaking of weird tornado behavior..check out this pic

It sucked out the ceiling, left the insulation, the furnishings.

[proud2BlibKansan]

19. There was a bad tornado here when I was a kid

One of my friends lived in a house without a basement. So her mom gathered up her children and started down the street to the neighbor's basement. On the way, her mom realized she had left the baby asleep in her bedroom, which was on the corner of the house. So her mom ran back to get the baby and got to the neighbor's basement just in time.

After the storm, they went back home and their house was completely intact - except the room where the baby had been sleeping. It had been sliced away from the house, like the corner of a cake. Just gone, only that one room.

[Iggo]

21. Kick.

"So very many people have lost everything, having even a picture returned to them would mean so much."

That part got me.

[BlueIris]

23. Thanks.

Mostly kicking to bump over the Royal wedding threads, though.

[dixiegrrrrl]

26. Well, we know that Royal watching is more important than a few 100 deaths, yessiree.

Ty for kicking, and for caring.

[madokie]

24. Heres what we did when we found a photo album that someone had ditched

along with some other items that made it appear that someone had done a burglary and were ditching the evidence. I/we took it directly to the police station and gave it to the clerk and gave a statement as to how we came about this. We didn't look to see if we knew anyone in the pictures as I didn't feel it was any of my/our business. The police let us know a few days later that the family thanked us when they returned the items to them. I felt good for not invading someones privacy and I felt it was a lesson by example on living by ones convictions to my young stepsons.

[Skidmore]

27. I saw a story on ABC this morning about a Facebook page

started by a woman to match lost possession up with their owners.

Here is a link for it.

http://www.facebook.com/PicturesandDocumentsfoundafterAprilTornadoes?ref=ts&sk=wall