The Billings Gazette from Billings, Montana • 15

The Billings Gazette July 18, 1979 ut xcoty was lucky WdS CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) The tornado that slapped Cheyenne Monday is already being called the worst natural disaster ever to hit Wyoming's capital, yet officials say the city was lucky. Trnod iiip4wpwwwpiiwwwww xi, wiw mi mi ii.ii m- if jn awsc yf i 1 1 1 It could have been much worse, they said Tuesday. "If it had come an hour and 15 minutes later, we would have suffered a severe casualty list," Bob Wilson of the Laramie County Civil Defense agency said. "But it came before people got off work." "The injuries have been phenomonally minimal," Mayor Don Erickson said.

A 14-month-old boy was killed, scores were injured, and an estimated 400 houses and mobile homes were damaged when the slow-moving twister bludgeoned a two-block path through residential areas on the city's northern fringe. Damages were estimated in the millions Officials said casualties might have been worse had the storm traveled through more densely populated residential areas to the south. The tornado first hit a subdivision west of this city of rolled over Warren Air Force Base, narrowly missed the governor's mansion, and crossed a golf course and Cheyenne's airport before slashing into a National Guard armory and the residential areas. "It looked like it did a tapdance in a couple of areas it stood still and wiggled around a little," said Wilson, whose home was among those damaged. Federal Disaster Assistance Administration officials toured the devasted area Tuesday and began helping Cheyenne officials make formal application for federal relief.

Gov. Ed Herschler has asked President Carter to declare Cheyenne a disaster area. "I'm certain the president will honor my request for aid," Herschler said. Meanwhile, Cheyenne residents began returning to the rubble of what had been their homes. Some were grim-faced, but others joked about their plight.

Erickson estimated the tornado totally destroyed 140 houses or trailers, rendered another 100 unihabitable but repairable and caused minor damage to at least 150 more. He said the clean-up is going as well as could be expected. riT i'-'ii iiiiiMMim mi im ''a iinnum maSSfr' hi. He re-upped to give his help CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) Chuck Moran, former National Guard staff sergeant and Vietnam veteran, answered the guard's call for assistance in Cheyenne, although he had been out of uniform for "some time." Moran sported a full beard when he appeared at the guard's signup table late Monday afternoon in the wake of a tornado that ripped through Cheyenne, Capt John Cornelison said.

Moran said he just wanted "to help," Cornelison said. But Cornelison said the guard can't assign anyone to active duty who is not currently in the guard. Moran had an easy solution to that problem. He reenlisted, on the spot. Asked if Moran was ordered to shave the full beard, Cornelison said, "We didn't press it (last night)." I The first tornado touch down in Chf proaches the city edge Monday, The! iured nearly 40 pefld killed 14-month-oldJr of Cheyenne.

'fiJij (Li te-M t- I 7.i!,7 jr 1.. JoWMUt.nAj The mayor also said plans are going ahead for Cheyenne Frontier Days, the city's annual western celebration which includes the world's largest outdoor rodeo. Frontier Days chairman Duane VonKrosigk, who said his office has been flooded with telephone calls from around the country, said the storm missed the rodeo grounds and Cheyenne tourist facilities. Eight persons remained hospitalized Tuesday, two in serious condition, and there were conflicting reports about the number of injuries. Erickson said 57 persons were injured in the storm, but officials of three Cheyenne hospitals attributed only 43 injuries to the storm.

Others suffered indirect injuries from traffic accidents or probing through rubble, they said. Most seriously injured were Linda McKinnon, 32, who suffered back injurires, and her son, Mat, 2, who received a head injury. Another son, Aaron, 4, was treated and released Monday, a hospital spokesman said. A third son, 14-month-old David, died instantly of head injuries received when the tornado struck the family's mobile home northeast of Cheyenne, Laramie County Coroner Roger Radomsky said. Law officers and National Guardsmen continued to patrol the tornado-stricken area against sightseerers and possible looters.

There were unconfirmed reports of possible looting but no reports of missing property and no arrests, and a police spokesman speculated most reports stemmed from residents looking for belongings. Wilson said with all the patrols and security lights, "anyone in the area who was going to loot would have had a heck of a time." Survivors tell of riding tornado CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) Cheyenne area residents bounced like human pingpong balls inside containers that were thrown about recklessly by a tornado that thumped across the city's fringe. Cathy Lotescher and Richard Pacheco were resting Tuesday in DePaul Hospital, counting themselves among the luckiest survivors of Monday's powerful twister. Mrs.

Loetescher, 19, said she and her 3-month-old daughter. Amber, were inside their mobile borne when the twister approached the 17 trailer Shannon Heights court northeast of Cheyenne. "I looked out my front window," she said, "and I seen swirling clouds and real dark stuff, and then I looked out the kitchen window and saw the tornado two trailers over." "I grabbed my daughter and went to her bedroom and opened the window," Mrs. Loetescher said. She said she had been told opening a window equalizes pressure.

The tornado lifted the trailer from its foundation, she said. "It started tumbling and rolling," Mrs. Loetescher said. After the tornado had left, she said her home was so snat-. tered she didn't know whether she was inside or outside.

"I don't know what happened," she said. "We were in the eye of a tornado." She got up, looked around and found Amber nearby. "When I found my daughter," she said, "I grabbed her and started running." Pacheco, 21, had left bis job with the Cheyenne Sanitation Department about 3.30 p.m. and was driving home when the tornado struck. "All of a sudden I saw roofs and pieces of houses flying off." Pacheco said.

"These boards were flying across the Tornados have killed before in Wyoming either." The subdivision was developed in recent years. He estimated winds in Monday's twister at 150-200 miles an hour. Winds are assessed on the basis of damage and skid paths, and no measurements of those have yet been made. Tornadoes are not unusual in southeastern Wyoming. Last year, 36 tornadoes hit La- was reported "in a July 20, 1978, twister in Natrona County, Beebe said.

Before Monday, the last death from a Wyoming tornado occurred June 26, 1959, when a tornado hit 30 miles east of Greybull, causing one death and one injury. Two persons were killed and four injured the evening of June 25, 1942, in Wheatland, Beebe said. the ground in Cheyenne for about a half hour. Some residents of the hard-hit Buffalo Ridge area of Cheyenne said at first they thought the windstorm was just a dust deviL Valtinson explained that tornadoes and dust devils are the reverse of each other. Tornadoes are caused by thunderstorm condensation and downward circulation.

The funnel comes down from the clouds, be said, although grourK" debris rises. A dust devil is caused by "super heating" of the ground on sunny days, Valtinson said. Rising air sets up little eddies, forming a funnel-shape from the ground up. Generally, a dust devil is less destructive. Yesterday's storm was triggered by an upper level disturbance, a "short-wave trough" caused by the transfer of beat energy between the north and south latitudes, Valtinson said.

The weather forecast for the next few days in Cheyenne: more thunderstorms. But Valtinson said no severe storm watches were expected.1 Tornados have killed four others in Wyoming. The last fatality was in 1958. CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) Statistically, the city of Cheyenne was ripe for tornado destruction.

National Weather Service records go back 110 years, lead forecaster and meterolo-gist Lynn Valtinson said Tuesday, and no tornado has ever hit Cheyenne before. While Wyoming is far from "Tornado Alley." Monday's twister in Cheyenne was not the first killer whirlwind in the Cowboy State. The National Weather Service said Tuesday tornadoes have caused four deaths before Monday's storm, which killed an infant and injured nearly four score others Robert Beebe, meteorologist in charge in Cheyenne, compiled a list of destructive tornadoes in Wyoming late last year snowing the last death occured in 1959, but two injuries were reported in separate twisters last summer. One person was injured in a July 4, 1978 tornado that struck a cabin in Big Horn County west of Sheridan, and another injury ramie County alone. But this particular tornado was unusual because the funnel formation lasted up to hours in Wyoming.

Forecasters were unable to venf; the length of time it was on the grour Valtinson said, because it was in a urea with no eyewitnesses for much of tha(. tin. Wi nesses have said the twister was on Beebe has compiled his list of destructive Wyoming tornadoes over the years, but he agreed the July 16. 1979, Cheyenne tornado goes down as the worst. Valtinson said tornadoes have been sighted from the city in past years, although none did any damage.

"But you've got to remember," be said, "Buffalo Ridge wasn't there in the past sky" i I.