Joyce Vaughn sits in her rebuilt home in the Hamilton Mill subdivision and recalls the 1997 tornado that destroyed her home in the neighborhood along Jenkins Road in East Brainerd. She is still haunted by the terror of the events.
Staff photo by John Rawlston/Chattanooga Times Free PressWhen Joyce Vaughn woke in the dead of night on March 27, 1997, a noise was the first indication something was wrong.
Vaughn, then 67, roused from a deep sleep just after 1 a.m. to what she thought was hail “as large as tennis balls” hitting the roof of her house in East Brainerd. Still groggy from medication she was taking for an upcoming spinal fusion, she sought her husband, Wes, who had moved into the dining room.
That’s when the tornado hit.
“As soon as he stepped away from the window, the windows imploded on him,” Ms. Vaughn said. “Then, he went in the dining room, and it did the same thing.”
The Vaughn family took shelter in an alcove near their bedroom as the roof was ripped off. The house was completely destroyed.