Microburst recalled 10 years later

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Photograph of Delbert Hohn that was published in a Daily Republic extra edition the day a microburst hit Mitchell, Aug. 5, 2000. The wreckage shown in the photo is what remained of Hohn’s trailer house. (Republic file photo)
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Hohn is shown this week in front of his new trailer house at a different but nearby location in Mitchell. (Tom Lawrence/Republic Photo)

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• Photos from the 2000 Mitchell microburst

Delbert Hohn received his 15 minutes of fame a decade ago today, but he won’t celebrate the anniversary.

Hohn was one of hundreds of Mitchell residents whose lives took a turn for the worse after a massive windstorm swept through the city Aug. 5, 2000. Ten people were hurt, several homes were destroyed or damaged and more than two dozen businesses felt the wrath of the storm.

Weather officials dubbed the event a wet microburst, a downward wind shear that is similar to a tornado in impact. Unlike a swirling tornado, a wet microburst is a straight-line wind accompanied by heavy rain.

A photograph of Hohn, then 46, seated by the wreckage of his mobile home on Norway Avenue, was atop the front page of a special edition of The Daily Republic that day.

“Lotta noise,” Hohn said Tuesday when asked about his memory of that night. He was bruised when the storm blew through the trailer and knocked him back into the bathroom.

The mobile home Hohn owned and lived in was destroyed in the microburst that struck Mitchell at about 2:05 a.m.

Hohn said he didn’t have insurance and the mobile home was a total loss. He’s unsure how much he lost.

“Never, ever figured it out,” Hohn said. “Just forgot it.”

He rented a house for six months before buying another trailer in Mitchell, which he still lives in at Middle Border Estates Mobile Home Park. Hohn, who said he always remembered the date of the storm, said he won’t do anything special today.

He said the storm is mostly out of his mind, although when he first moved into another trailer, he was nervous when storms approached.

“But I got over that,” Hohn said.

His loss and injuries weren’t the first in family history linked to a major storm in Mitchell. His cousin, Dewayne Hohn, was injured in a tornado that rampaged through the city May 21, 1962.

Dewayne Hohn died five years later and his brother, Larry, told The Daily Republic the injuries Dewayne suffered in the tornado led to his death.

The 2000 storm didn’t claim any lives, although it did leave a few people battered and bruised and shook a lot of people in and around Mitchell.

Eric and Nancy Miller’s home south of Mitchell was demolished in the storm. The roof was torn off and most of their possessions scattered.

“I’m very lucky, extremely lucky, because we’re all still alive,” Eric Miller said in the wake of the storm, according to a Daily Republic article. “But a lot of things of sentimental value were lost.”

More than two dozen businesses were impacted, with some damaged beyond repair and others that had water flood into their buildings. Damage estimates topped $2 million at the time. Jerry Thomsen was president of Trail King Industries when the microburst hit Mitchell. The north wall of the firm’s building was blown down, and there was water damage and other destruction. The damage was in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, Thomsen recalled. “It did cut production slightly,” he said. But he said the firm was open for business the following Monday. In some ways, the quick rebound is what he most firmly recalls. “The people of Trail King and the community came together to respond,” Thomsen said. “I have to almost consider it a positive thing because of the things I got to witness.”

The Dakota Wesleyan University physical plant was destroyed, the campus athletics center was “left a shambles,” according to a Daily Republic story, and a storage shed was “ripped open.”

Greg Harmon, then and now the meteorologist in charge of the National Weather Service office in Sioux Falls, recalled the storm and shared a report he filed 14 hours after it struck. The report can be viewed at www.mitchellrepublic.com.

Harmon said “powerful straight-line winds” struck the southwestern part of Mitchell. The damage to the area occurred from 2 a.m. to 2:10 a.m., he said, and the swath of the storm was a mile to 1.5 miles wide.

Harmon said two storms combined and

“explosive development” west of Mitchell. While a small F1 tornado briefly touched down, it apparently caused no damage, he said.

But the straightline winds, which Harmon said peaked at 120 mph, did plenty.

“In some ways, the damage was more widespread than if it had been a tornado,” he said.

Harmon came to Mitchell and did the on-site assessment the morning after the storm. He said he determined it was a straight-line microburst wind event based primarily on the debris pattern and a review of radar data from the NWS Sioux Falls Doppler Radar.

He said the storm caused a great deal of damage, but the amazing thing was that no one was killed, especially with it striking at 2:05 a.m.

Some people were critical of the fact that emergency sirens didn’t sound to alert them to the approaching storm.

Davison County Emergency Management Director Jim Montgomery said the storm caused a change of policy on the use of sirens, at least for a time.

Montgomery, who wasn’t emergency management director when the storm hit, said the policy was “changed and then changed back.”

The policy had been to only sound the sirens when a tornado warning was issued, indicating a tornado touchdown was highly possible.

The policy was changed to sound the sirens in case of a severe thunderstorm. But, he said, that had an unintended side effect.

“Really, they stopped paying attention to them,” Montgomery said.

The policy was changed back to sounding the sirens only if a tornado warning is issued.

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