Hays High AD: 'It's just kind of eerie'
By DIANE GASPER-O'BRIEN
Clint Albers normally goes home for a few weeks during the summer to help his dad with wheat harvest.
Albers, assistant principal and athletic director at Hays High School, will be spending more time in the Chapman area this summer.
Home for Albers is Chapman, a town of 1,400 about 38 miles east of Salina, which was hit by a tornado at about 10:30 p.m. Wednesday.
His parents, Kenny and Kathy Albers, are safe, as is his grandmother, Lois Albers. Their farm homes are about 5 miles south of Chapman, and the storm that destroyed numerous homes and businesses in town just missed their farms.
But Albers still is concerned about another relative who has yet to be located, as well as friends and people he knew growing up.
"My immediate family is OK, except for my great uncle, so that was good to hear," he said. "But a lot of the rest of the town, people I've known for a long time, were affected."
He said his parents are checking with shelters in Abilene and Salina that have been set up for victims to see if they can locate his elderly great uncle, Don Frohardt.
Albers said initial reports from family and friends about buildings that either received substantial damage or were destroyed completely have included the Methodist Church which he attended as a child.
The schools he attended also were reportedly hit hard.
"I talked to a friend of ours who teaches at the high school there, and it sounds like the schools are extensively damaged," said Albers, a 1994 graduate of Chapman High School. "The gym was hit at the high school. It's all kind of surreal."
Albers said he planned to see his folks this weekend because his youngest daughter, Lakin, will celebrate her first birthday Friday, and the Albers family has a party planned at their Hays home.
Until then, he expects to be in frequent contact with them by phone.
"It's just kind of eerie. As they talked on the news this morning about different buildings that had been hit, you know where all of them are," he said. "You see the camera crews there, and you know right where they're standing."
Albers said he was concerned for his family while watching the radar Wednesday night.
"I saw that it was heading toward Abilene," he said of a town 14 miles west of Chapman. "So I started keeping tabs on it."
At about 10:30 p.m., he reached his parents, who gave him some good news.
Albers also has been on the phone a lot with his younger sister, Kami Albers, a physician's assistant in Manhattan, which also was hit hard by storms Wednesday.
"I talked to my sister last night and called her again this morning," he said. "She said her office is OK, but it's right near the car dealership they keep showing on TV that was destroyed. And the lumberyard they talk about, she said it's gone. It's just not there anymore."
Albers said he's been receiving a lot of phone calls since about 6 this morning, from people asking if his relatives are safe and if they can do anything to help.
"That's how Kansas is," Albers said. "Everybody willing to help out in times of trouble."
One of those will be Albers himself. He said he plans to go help with cleanup in Chapman when people are allowed back into town.
The Kansas National Guard is providing security support, and as of this morning, they were securing the town to outside visitors other than emergency personnel.
"They will need help with cleaning up for a long time," he said. "When they let people in (to town), I'll go down there."