{"id":931,"date":"2023-04-01T18:30:08","date_gmt":"2023-04-01T18:30:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/?p=931"},"modified":"2023-04-03T14:36:49","modified_gmt":"2023-04-03T14:36:49","slug":"army-veteran-loses-home-in-mississippi-tornado","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/?p=931","title":{"rendered":"Army Veteran loses home in Mississippi tornado"},"content":{"rendered":"

This is the dramatic account of an Army Veteran who lost his home in a Mississippi tornado.<\/p>\n

Army Veteran Jimmy Lee Barfield was watching the television with his wife. The weatherman was on the screen talking about storms passing through Louisiana and Arkansas. And that\u2019s when things began to change, rapidly.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe weatherman was getting very excited. The storm was coming across the river with a vengeance,\u201d said Barfield, a resident of Rolling Fork, which is a dozen miles from the banks of the Mississippi River and site of where meteorologists estimated the storm was traveling to at 60-70 mph.<\/p>\n

\u201cI went to the front door and I couldn\u2019t see anything to the west. It was just black,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

Army Veteran Jimmy Lee Barfield<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\u201cGo to the bathroom,\u201d he told his wife. Joining her in the bathroom, he said, \u201cGet in the tub and put your head down. Don\u2019t look up.\u201d<\/p>\n

Barfield, confined to a wheelchair, threw a leg over his wife to help protect her. Then he said a prayer for his family\u2019s safety.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen everything got quiet. The roar kept getting louder and louder like a big jet engine. Our ears popped. I saw the roof over our bathroom take off. I raised up my head and looked into the eyes of a monster.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe house is gone.\u201d<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Barfield put his head back down and, within the next few seconds, it was over. His wife poked her head out of the tub, took in the scene, and began crying. \u201cThe house is gone,\u201d she cried.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo babe,\u201d Barfield recalled saying. \u201cIt\u2019s just part of the roof that flew away.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNo. The house is gone,\u201d his wife told him.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe was right,\u201d Barfield admits now. \u201cBut I could only see a little bit. My wheelchair was destroyed. I looked around and couldn\u2019t get over how fast it happened. And that\u2019s where we were when we were rescued in our bathroom. You looked back at the bathroom and you could see the 2x4s that laid around us. It created a shield over us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Barfield believes it was the hand of God protecting them, as they were soon evacuated to the Rolling Fork National Guard Armory. First responders brought in residents amidst the downed power lines and a massive debris field that used to be the homes of 2,000 Rolling Fork residents. Red Cross, Mississippi Emergency Management Agency and local ambulance crews triaged residents and helped wherever they could.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I saw VA arrive, I told my wife we were going to be OK.\u201d<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Just hours later, the Mobile Medical Unit from the G.V. (Sonny) Montgomery VA<\/a> in Jackson, Mississippi, arrived on site with social workers and emergency management personnel.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I saw VA arrive, I told my wife we were going to be OK,\u201d Barfield said.<\/p>\n

VA social workers helped him and his wife, providing immediate needs of clothing, food and shelter. They sent word back to the medical center for his medications before they were further evacuated to Jackson, Mississippi. But, before departing Rolling Fork, Barfield took a video call from VA Secretary Denis McDonough.<\/p>\n

\u201cLook at that,\u201d Barfield told his wife. \u201cHere\u2019s the secretary of VA and he\u2019s asking about us. He talks to the president, but he\u2019s concerned about us.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is the dramatic account of an Army Veteran who lost his home in a Mississippi tornado. Army Veteran Jimmy Lee Barfield was watching the television with his wife. The weatherman was on the screen talking about storms passing through Louisiana and Arkansas. And that\u2019s when things began to change, rapidly. \u201cThe weatherman was getting […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":933,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,19,20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-931","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-health","category-tornado","category-va-mobile-medical-unit"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/931","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=931"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/931\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":937,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/931\/revisions\/937"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/933"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=931"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=931"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=931"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}