First We Had Tornado Pickup Truck Guy, Now We Have Tornado Clubhouse Guy

Cliff Horton had this chaotic view
of the building he was leaning
against disintegrating in a 
Georgia tornado last week. 

I guess this is turning out to be the spring of narrow tornado escapes.  

First we had the teenage in the pickup truck that got tossed violent around by a tornado, and then the teen blithely drove away from the chaos.

Now we have Cliff Horton, the Golf Clubhouse Tornado Guy. 

Horton was accidentally locked out of a the Black Creek Golf Course clubhouse in Ellabell, Georgia when a powerful tornado approached last Tuesday.  .

The National Weather Service office in Charleston, South Carolina said the tornado reached maximum strength around the golf course, with peak winds of at least 165 mph, which would make it a high end EF-3 tornado.  The NWS office said they want to investigate more to determine if it was actually an even stronger EF-4.

The tornado killed one person and injured several others. So yes, this was an extremely dangerous situation.  And Horton should absolutely, positively NOT been outside.  But as I said, he was accidentally locked out. He just had to take his chances. 

You can watch Horton's experience by clicking on this hyperlink to view the video. 

The striking thing about Horton is how amazingly he held his composure during the tornado. At the very least, I'd desperately need a new pair of pants if I had experienced the same thing. 

First you see the tornado knocking over several trees in the middle distance across a large lawn. "That is not good," Horton says in his southern drawl, figuratively putting on his Captain Obvious hat. 

Suddenly, you see winds start screaming from behind him, shredding a large oak tree. Then a large wave of debris races into view from above and crashes onto the ground in front of him, with many pieces swirling violently in front of him.

We hear Horton say "There goes the roof!" in a tone of voice you might use if you saw your cat knocked your glass off the coffee table for the umpteenth time. 

After the tornado passes, Horton surveys the field of debris, and says what all of us might. "Ho-Lee Crap!"  .

Unlike the Texas Tornado Teen, Horton has so far not made a round of media interviews, so I don't know what he's thinking now that we're a few days after the storm. 

Horton was extremely lucky because the part of the tornado that shredded the golf clubhouse came from the direction behind him, which meant presumably there were a few walls between Horton and the direction the wind was coming from.

When the roof disintegrated, it flew over him, crashing in the yard in front of him. It appears any debris  smashing through the building was blocked by the walls behind him. 

Horton didn't mean to be out in that tornado. But word to the wise: Don't try this at home!  Horton got lucky. Pretty much anybody else who is out in such a storm very likely wouldn't be. 

Here's another look at Horton's videos from USAToday. If you don't see the video below, click on this hyperlink. Otherwise, click on the YouTube logo in the image below to watch.