Citizens of Mapleton had no idea what they would be in for Saturday when a tornado tore through the town, leaving destruction everywhere in its wake.

Alyssa Sulsberger, junior in advertising, lives just one mile outside of Mapleton and was home when the storm occurred.

“We were downstairs in the basement and my dad came down with what I thought was a golf ball,” Sulsberger said. “It was a piece of hail he had found outside.”

The Sulsberger family had no idea anything was occurring outside as far as a tornado. They went upstairs to find what damage the storm had done.

“We could hear sirens and I remember the sky looked really yellow,” Sulsberger said. “While we had been down in the basement the power had gone out for a little while but nothing exciting had really happened. Then my uncle, who is the mayor of Mapleton, called us and said there were gas leaks in town and houses coated in mud. We thought a funnel cloud had just gone over the town, we didn’t really know there had been a tornado.”

The next day the family went into the town of Mapleton to investigate the damage for themselves.

“We saw some grain bins were gone but we had no idea of the real damage until we got to the south side,” Sulsberger said. “People kept saying that houses were gone but I figured they just meant like roof damage or stuff like that. In a small town, things can get exaggerated and that’s what I thought was happening.”

In total, 120 homes were destroyed in an area of 12 to 15 blocks in the southwest area of Mapleton when the tornado struck around 7:20 p.m.

Laura Hoaglund, senior in meteorology, was out chasing the storm with some friends about 20 miles away in Onawa.

“We were watching a funnel cloud, hoping it’d produce a tornado in the open field we were watching,” Hoaglund said. “Little did we know that 20 miles down the road the same super cell would produce in my hometown.”

Upon hearing that the tornado had landed in Mapleton, Hoaglund said she was devastated.

“My heart sank, I was sick to my stomach and I had a hard time believing that it was real. I just prayed that everyone was okay,” Hoaglund said.

“Being a huge weather buff, I have seen things like this happen before: tornadoes ripping through and destroying towns. We always say a few prayers, send your warm thoughts and help out any way that we can; but then we move on because it doesn’t affect us directly,” she said. “This is a rude awakening. When I start to think about how terrible this is, I just remember that everyone survived.”

As Hoaglund said, no deaths were reported. Only one person was reported injured and that was a broken leg.

In the days following the devastation, citizens and people from surrounding areas have been hard at work, cleaning up and salvaging what’s left of what was once their homes.

“The response has been overwhelming,” Sulsberger said. “People have come from other towns and said, ‘Hey we’re from such an such what can we do to help?’ People have been streaming in.”

“My younger brother, who is still in high school, texted me and told me that kids from Woodbine and other schools have come. He also said hundreds of kids from other schools have taken the day off from school and taken a bus to Mapleton to help out.

“My uncle has also put my mother and my aunt in charge of collecting donations from people so we can get a fund started to help the people of our town. We may be a small town but we’re survivors; we’ll get through this.”

Hoaglund said there are a lot of people volunteering to help Mapleton get back on its feet.

“I know a lot of people who took time off of work to stay and help. Schools from all over, including Parkersburg, are sending students to come help and a lot of my friends went home last weekend and are going home this weekend to help clean up,” Hoaglund said. “There has also been a couple of relief funds set up, the Salvation Army and the Red Cross disaster teams are in town and there has been a shelter set up for the people who have lost their homes. The generosity from both in- and out-of-towners simply amazes me.

“Everyone is keeping a positive attitude even throughout these circumstances. We just know that even though this is not an ‘ideal’ situation to be in, it could be worse. After all, no one was seriously injured or passed away,”  she said. “That’s what’s most important.”