I have seen many images and news footage of natural disasters over the years, but have never seen it in person. I live in Cookeville, TN, the city that was devastated early Tuesday morning by an EF4 tornado that tore through our community. Many of you know based on our political commentary, but I work in the healthcare field and what was experienced from the destruction is truly not fathomable. We have one hospital in our city and the next closest major facility is in either Nashville, Knoxville, or Chattanooga. At the time that the tornado hit, we currently had 20 patients being held in our Emergency Department waiting for beds to be opened up on nursing floors to accept them as inpatients... that is unfortunately normal for us as we are at full capacity almost year around. Approximately 100 patients were brought to us that morning by ambulance, passenger car, etc... and a main entrance to our facility quickly became a trauma triage unit to determine what patients needed immediate surgery, those that could be stabilized and put on a helicopter to be taken to other facilities, etc... It was amazing how a team works together in the most stressful circumstances almost without flaw. We have performed countless disaster "drills" over the years and most of the time there are significant issues that we just fail the test. When the actual event occurred, it couldn't have gone better. I was tasked escorting families/friends/etc... to a designated family holding area as they came to us assuming their loved ones had to be hear since they could not be contacted and their homes were in the direct path of the tornado. I really can't tell you how many people told me as I was directing them that they are looking for their child or a family member, it was heart-wrenching. Our community lost 18 people early Tuesday morning, 5 of which were little children that were literally pulled from their parents arms as the tornado ripped their homes apart and were thrown hundreds of feet away. Keep our community in your prayers, it will be a long recovery road. On a more positive note, their are also countless stories of miracles... just heard one last night where a mother and her daughter were pulled out of their home by the wind and thrown 150 feet away only to land in a swimming pool to cushion their blow... they crawled out of the pool and have only minor scrapes.