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The annual event is called Camp Grandma.Each year the cousins get together at their grandparents’ home a few miles east of Lake City. Wednesday afternoon, there were eight cousins at the home when the skies darkened and a tornado touched down. The game of hide and seek, which had been going on in the basement, switched to an impromptu duck and cover. The kids huddled under the pool table for safety from the tornado that was tearing apart the home just above them. “Most of the noises were just crashing from upstairs, but right before we dove under the pool table — it’s like your ears in high altitude — it feels like that, and then they pop,” said Holden Buse, one of the cousins. “And then that’s when we heard all the crashing and we dove under the pool table.”Everyone part of Camp Grandma survived, but there was little left of the home that the Buse family had lived in for more than 40 years. “This can all be replaced, but family can’t,” Holden said. “I think family is more important than any of this here, so it’s great that one was hurt.”Without prompting, dozens of neighbors arrived at the home Thursday with everything from homemade treats to heavy machinery. All set to work helping clean up the property and preserve what could be found. “This is the way we work in the rural community,” said Dan Reynolds, a neighbor to the Buses. “I mean somebody has an event like this, everybody’s going to show up to help. We’re sorry for their loss but we’ll do what we can do to make it better for them.”
The annual event is called Camp Grandma.
Each year the cousins get together at their grandparents’ home a few miles east of Lake City. Wednesday afternoon, there were eight cousins at the home when the skies darkened and a tornado touched down.
The game of hide and seek, which had been going on in the basement, switched to an impromptu duck and cover. The kids huddled under the pool table for safety from the tornado that was tearing apart the home just above them.
“Most of the noises were just crashing from upstairs, but right before we dove under the pool table — it’s like your ears in high altitude — it feels like that, and then they pop,” said Holden Buse, one of the cousins. “And then that’s when we heard all the crashing and we dove under the pool table.”
Everyone part of Camp Grandma survived, but there was little left of the home that the Buse family had lived in for more than 40 years.
“This can all be replaced, but family can’t,” Holden said. “I think family is more important than any of this here, so it’s great that one was hurt.”
Without prompting, dozens of neighbors arrived at the home Thursday with everything from homemade treats to heavy machinery. All set to work helping clean up the property and preserve what could be found.
“This is the way we work in the rural community,” said Dan Reynolds, a neighbor to the Buses. “I mean somebody has an event like this, everybody’s going to show up to help. We’re sorry for their loss but we’ll do what we can do to make it better for them.”