Return To Little Sioux
Mason Flora has a tattoo just above his heart.
It features the date June 11, 2008, and a tornado, inked like a merit badge one might see on a Boy Scout sash.
For Flora, the tattoo marks a day he’ll never forget.
On June 11, 2008, Flora, then 15 years old, was one of nearly 100 scouts camping out at the Little Sioux Scout Ranch when a fast-moving, rain-wrapped tornado sprung from a thunderstorm and roared through the 1,800-acre campground south of Sioux City.
Four scouts were killed in the storm. Dozens more were injured. Flora among them. He suffered a deep cut on his back, a mild concussion and bumps and bruises.
Last week, Flora, now 25, returned to the Little Sioux camp on the 10-year anniversary of the deadly tornado. He brought along his girlfriend and his dog for the visit. He’d been back to the camp a few times since that night in 2008, but hadn’t spent much time there since graduating from Glenwood Community High School in 2011. Making the trip back from his home in Bloomfield, Colo., where he is a solar power installer, on the 10th anniversary was important to him.
“I had a friend coming to visit me in Colorado and I told him, ‘Yeah come on out, but I’m going to be in Iowa on June 11.’ It was something I’d planned to do for a while.”
He got the tattoo about 18 months after the tornado. Every day, it reminds him of that tragic night that seems so recent and yet, at the same time, so long ago.
“I feel like I remember everything even though I passed out a couple times,” Flora said. “I can remember everything right there. I can remember it all until once the ambulances started showing up and everyone was running around and doing first aid. Then everything really became hectic.”
Wednesday, June 11, 2008, was hot and muggy. Flora and his fellow scouts could see the clouds roll in. They took cover when it rained off and on but it just felt like any other early summer storm.
“It had rained and stormed all day,” Flora said. “We didn’t think anything of it. It was a storm in Iowa, no big deal.”
When word spread of possible severe weather, Flora and his Life Scout Troop 23 group huddled under a table inside a building as the storm rumbled in, kicking up wind and smacking the walls. The campground had no tornado shelter.
At 6:35 p.m., the camp’s severe weather siren shrieked to life and seconds later the tornado touched down. Many of the campers didn’t see the funnel until it emerged from clouds behind a bluff to the southwest.
Flora can recall the wind being sucked from the room and the big double doors to the building rattling and then being torn off the hinges. The roof of the structure went next.
Amidst the chaos and reign of debris and falling cinder blocks from the floor to ceiling fire place that collapsed in the shelter, Flora lost consciousness.
The tornado was on the ground for less than 10 seconds. But not before tearing a devastating half-mile wide path of destruction through the camp. The National Weather Service pegged the tornado as an EF3, with winds exceeding 145 miles per hour.
Boy Scouts Josh Fennen, 13, Sam Thomsen, 13, and Ben Petrzilka, 14, all of Omaha, and Aaron Eilerts, 13, of Eagle Grove were killed. Dozens suffered broken bones. Several victims were taken by medical helicopter to Omaha hospitals with serious injuries.
The camp was leveled in the storm - many of the buildings reduced to rubble. Toppled trees and tents were strewn over a 100-yard swath. A counselor’s car was reportedly thrown nearly 100 feet.
Flora, like the other campers ages 13 to 18 at the scout ranch, was there for a week-long leadership training class. Just that day, the scouts participated in a disaster preparedness drill. In the 20 minutes it took most of the first responders to reach the camp, the scouts tendered first aid. Flora doesn’t remember running to get counselors to report injuries, but was told he did.
In the days and months that followed the storm, Flora said he likely suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder. The events of that day, the emotions and the fear playing out in his mind over and over. He had nightmares and spoke with a therapist provided by the Boy Scouts of America.
“I can remember, not too long after, going to church one morning and there was a storm outside,” Flora said. “I had to go hang out in the basement. I got over it pretty quick. It was the wind. I hate the wind. I like storms, but I hate the wind.”
Flora helped raise more than $20,000 to help rebuild the camp and the fundraising helped ease his anxiety.
He says now he feels like that day is behind him and he’s gotten over the trauma that once haunted him. But, he admits, certain weather conditions still can stir up unpleasant memories.
As Flora walked the grounds of Little Sioux last Monday, he was stirred once again by the memories of the camp, the storm and the aftermath. The camp appears much different than it did on that night and has since added a chapel, a ranger station and two hardened storm shelters. But hiking the camp with his girlfriend and dog, he said he wasn’t as emotional as he thought he might be.
“There was a storm coming,” Flora said. “I thought about maybe getting in one of the shelters and waiting it out, see what it was like. But my girlfriend talked me out of it. I’ve got different responsibilities now. I’m glad I came back though.”
Flora said the visit likely won’t be his last.
“I think we’re going to come back this summer,” he said. “We think we found a good camping spot.”