WARRENVILLE, S.C. () — Right now, cleanup is underway in Warrenville after an early morning storm ripped through the community.
This afternoon, the National Weather Service verified the passage of an EF-1 tornado through the vicinity of Langley, S.C., at approximately 3:30 a.m. on Monday morning.
“I literally been crying since 4 a.m. when I seen my car crushed,” Alicia Mason shared.
Alicia and Brandon Mason woke up to chaos.
“I looked out the window, I seen tornado jump through my front yard and told her it was a tornado. I lost my car. I had three, four trees down in my yard,” Brandon said.
“I have five children and now I have no transportation, and I only had the minimum coverage of liability because that’s only what I could afford,” Alicia added. “And so now I have no way of getting another vehicle.”
They say the storm kept going after Dunbar Street—slamming into a nearby fire station.
Their 1861 home stood strong.
“There is no damage to the roof except for that one little shingle. We said we ain’t worried about that shingle,” Alicia Mason.
Neighbors say they were caught completely off guard.
“My son, who lives a couple houses down, this is my mother-in-law’s house, called me and said ‘Mama, I think a tornado. And we immediately got clothes on and come up to check on everybody’ and you can see it’s a mess,” Kim Durden said.
The damage stretches across this tight-knit community. Roofs ripped off. Trees snapped.
Dominion Energy crews worked through the day, trying to get the lights back on.
“Like a train was coming through,” James Robertson recalled. “I was like, ‘oh my goodness, what’s going on?’ So I jumped up, grabbed my pants and just freaking out. ‘Cause I never experienced before. I came to my back door and I thought that my roof had got snatched off the back door.”
James Robertson found debris everywhere. He spent time checking on neighbors. Lives disrupted again—less than a year after Helene.
“It’s confined to this one area, but I would say it’s about the same with the damage to the trees and the houses. I would say it’s about the same,” Malissa Thomas said.
“PTSD from that, you know, just not even a year ago we had Helene again,” James added. “This come through kind of like makes you scared. Like, you know, it’s just something you’ll never think happened to you in your neighborhood.”
Neighbors rallied, checking on each other in the dark. Responders showed up fast.
“The chief at the Langley department, he checked on us, his wife, they kind of reached out. Red Cross has been on top of everything. They’ve been very, very supportive,” James added.
Alicia Mason tells me her mother-in-law, who’s still recovering from a crash herself, is doing what she can to help with the car situation. Keep in mind — only the National Weather Service can officially say if it was a tornado.
