Cousins spot tornado as it destroys grandparents' farm

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By Ashley Arnold – KIPP, KANSAS (KSNW) — Severe storms destroyed a farm house in Saline County Thursday, as family members were nearby watching the storm.

Gustaf Applequist, his cousin and mother were in the area when they first saw the storm.

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"My mom and I were driving down I-135, heading towards Wichita basically, and I looked over and happened to see a tornado and my mom is like hey, that's where — your grandparents house isn't far from there," said Applequist.

They decided to go to the area and check it out. But they weren't prepared for what they found.

The home was heavily damaged, buildings were damaged and large trucks and a combine were flipped over and destroyed.

"Yep, just kind of, it's amazing how quickly something you know, that you have tons of memories of can just be reduced to nothing," said Applequist.

"I guess, we saw what happened in Greensburg and I was worried it would look like that, and when you see big trees reduced to toothpicks, it's kind of awe-inspiring by the power of the tornado," said Tyler Lund, Applequist's cousin.

Debris from the farm was strewn throughout the fields, sheets of metal were wrapped around trees that had been ripped apart. It was hard for the family to see.

"Well this is our grandparent's house and farm, luckily they, my grandfather passed away here about 6 months ago so he doesn't have to be here to see his farm reduced to this," said Applequist.

"One of the things he really taught us is not to store up our treasures here on earth–you know, moth and rust can destroy it, tornadoes can take it away, and so I think he'd be sad to see this, but I also know he invested it somewhere else,"

Their grandmother is now in a nursing home and wasn't there at the time. There were no injuries reported from the storm.