Tampa Bay Times from St. Petersburg, Florida • 21

section SUNDAY, OCTOBER 4, 1992 A '1 DZADT a The meteorologist on duty in Ruskin never saw the tornadoes on radar. But officials in Miami had said conditions were ripe for them. Crowd cheers Bush's promises The president gave Tampa Bay a gift with one hand and Bill Clinton a jab with the other. By ELLEN DEBENPORT Timet Political Edrtor CLEARWATER President Bush campaigned in Tampa Bay on Saturday with Santa's sack slung over his shoulder. He gave MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa a weather station that will keep the runways open.

Then he spent 20 minutes telling an audience of older people frightening stories about a European socialist big spender named Bill Clinton. Bush was warmly applauded by nearly 1,200 people who braved wretched weather Saturday morning to hear him speak at On Top of the World, a condominium complex so enormous that it contains three voting precincts. Fifty-eight percent of voters there are Republican. "It was a good speech," said Hazel Prach, 71, "if he can just get the points over like he did today. He doesn't seem to be aggressive enough in his speeches." She said she thinks Bush could be re-elected if only because people prefer "the devil you know rather than the devil that's waiting Please see BUSH 9B NV 7 i Derrel Gordon surveys the tornado damage in his neighbor's yard in Beacon neighbor's car wound up in his yard.

Run subdivision. The two cars shown are Tint photo ADfllAN DENNIS his son's and wife's; Gordon said a others and causing millions of dollars in property damage. Paul Hebert, the weather service's top official in Florida, said a board of inquiry will be convened to determine how well the Ruskin office performed before, during and after the twisters. The board will have much to consider: Hebert said he and his staff in Miami reckoned a full day earlier that the big mass of stormy weather bearing down on Florida from the Gulf of Mexico was likely to generate tornadoes. In fact, Hebert said Saturday, "the records clearly show that there is a much higher incidence of severe thunderstorms and tornadoes coming into the Tampa Bay By DAVID K.

ROGERS Timet Staff Writ The National Weather Service meteorologist on duty when a string of killer tornadoes struck mid-Pinellas County said he issued no warning beforehand because there was nothing on his radar screen to indicate their presence. "Even severe thunderstorms weren't detected, and severe thunderstorms are something we would normally warn for," meteorologist Chuck Eggleton said Saturday. "They just weren't that strong." At least five tornadoes raked the county, killing three people, injuring dozens of Family, home fly into air As the storm lifted his mobile home, Sean Walker was sucked through the roof, still holding onto a mattress. Miraculously, he and his family survived. By DAVID OLINQER Tiro Staff Wfrtf Until 10:30 a.m.

Saturday, Sean Walker lived in a 70- by 14-foot mobile home with his wife, their infant son and her parents. At that minute, a powerful tornado struck without warning and took his family on a short and terrifying flight. It lifted their home and carried it 50 yards across an open field, tossing Walker through the open roof. The mobile home landed upside down. Miraculously, nobody was seriously hurt, not even the family dog.

"We were in what's left of the trailer out there," Walker said afterward, pointing to a heap of rubble in the field. He was holding his son's baby walker, which he had found several hundred feet away. Nearby, in a field soaked by a ruptured water line, lay the tiny outfit 6-month-old Jason had worn home from the hospital after his birth. On and around the mobile home, the possessions Please see AIR 4B Their world Atypical, although rainy afternoon for homeowners in Autumn Run and Beacon Run suddenly turned into a disaster. By BILL ADAIR, MONICA NICHOLE CHRISTIAN Tlm Staff Writer PINELLAS PARK Run and Autumn the mailboxes were Residents not lawns tidy and painted, they spent money and bought the of the 4 X.

Time id3LU2k i weather service criteria. That's typically the case with tornadoes forming over the Great Plains during the spring "But when's the last time you had cold, dry air in Florida in the middle of the summer?" Hebert asked. "There isn't any, but we still have tornadoes here." The radar system in the Ruskin office can't detect the presence of tornadoes. The weather service's newest generation of radar has some detection capability, but Ruskin isn't scheduled to get that system until 1995 at the earliest. Ruskin's weather radio station, which Please see WARNING 3B GETTING HELP Places for the injured and hungry to call Pinellas County Hotline for information on the injured: (813) 541-0700.

Red Cross shelters: Nina Harris School, 6000 70th Ave. Chapel on the Hill, 1260 Park Blvd. Three Red Cross mass feeding trucks were to begin offering meals in the devastated areas today. Victims with special needs can call the Red Cross: (813) 898-3111. Same number for contributions to help those devastated by the tornadoes.

For hurt or missing pets, call the SPCA The St. Petersburg Chapter of the Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals has a pet ambulance assigned to the disaster areas. Injured or lost animals can be treated or given temporary shelter. Residents without homes can board their animals at the SPCA shelter. The shelter is at 9099 130th Ave.

in Largo (three blocks south of Ulmerton Road just off Starkey Road). Cair 586-3591. Advice from your insurance adjuster Insurance adjusters already are at work in Pinellas and Pasco counties, responding to calls from policy holders. While insurance company policies and procedures differ, Nationwide Insurance offered this general advice: Contact your insurance company, many have toll-free numbers. If your home can't be lived in, go to a hotel and keep good records of expenses; many policies reimburse homeowners for such hotel expenses.

Once your claim has been registered, have patience. Adjusters generally try to get to the worst-hit policy holders first. area during the morning hours" than when stormy weather arrives at other times of day. Weather service procedures restrict government meteorologists from issuing warnings until a tornado has touched down. Issuing a tornado watch, a lesser designation meaning that tornados could form, is even harder.

Meteorologists can't issue them unless the conditions in Florida meet the criteria for tornado formation in Kansas, Oklahoma and other Midwestern states. Abundant cold, dry air must be mixing rapidly with lots of warm, moist air before a tornado watch can be issued, according to Photo by Oan McDutfio Missy Hanlon breaks into tears, above, as she describes how the tornado ripped into her family's mobile home on Indiana Avenue in northwest Hillsborough. At left are a boat and a home damaged on Roble Avenue in Spring Hill in Hernando County. Story, 4B tL photo OLIE STONEROOK The mailboxes, shrubbery and basketball hoops are gone. The storm ripped roofs from dozens of homes and shattered the windows in many others.

In one house, a roof shingle had broken through a window and was lodged in a wall like an ax head stuck in the side of a pine tree. A few hours earlier, residents were doing typical weekend things paying bills, watching TV, sleeping late. Suddenly they found Please see CRUMBLED 3B Board accuses doctor of 'coverup' Dr. William Near operated on the wrong side of a woman's spine. But what upset the board was his altering medical records.

By CAROL GENTRY Times Staff Writer MIAMI A surgeon from Largo's Diagnostic Clinic was accused Saturday of a Watergate-style coverup of an error he made. Dr. William Near's original mistake, the Florida Board of Medicine said, was not that serious. He operated on the wrong side of a patient's spine a year ago at HCA Largo Medical Center. He recognized the foul-up while the patient was in recovery, he said, and admitted it to her as soon as she woke up.

She agreed to let him do the correct surgery the following day. Near said he wasn't sure how it happened, other than he was extremely tired. It was his third operation that day. Please see DOCTOR 6B BRIEFLY Phone numbers just got longer Starting today, callers in Florida must dial the three-digit area code before all long-distance calls. That means many calls within the 813 area will require an area code prefix.

For example, 1-555-1234 would become 1 (813) 555-1234. Customers who forget will hear a recorded message advising them the call can't be completed. Phone companies say the move is necessary because they are running out of combinations for telephone numbers. In the Tampa Bay area, calls between Tampa, Clearwater, St. Petersburg and Tarpon Springs exchanges will continue to require only seven digits.

er crumbled around them DAVEY and In Beacon Run, even nice. only kept their houses freshly a little extra nice mailboxes top line from the local hardware store. It's not a fancy place. The homes in Beacon Run or Autumn Run typically cost $80,000 to $90,000. It's a place that seems to have at least one basketball hoop on every street.

It's a place where people spend hours waxing their cars, cleaning their boats, sweeping their driveways. In an instant, it was devastated. A tornado Saturday morning ripped through the neighborhood, killing at least two people and destroying or seriously damaging dozens of homes. In a few driveways Saturday afternoon, people stood and wept. MA..