Sample 20

Sample 20
1 Lone tumbleweed drifted by the front porch as I sat back in my rattan rocking chair, enjoying the smooth, peaceful music playing from the radio. I was a Singaporean, who had come with my younger sister through a scholarship. Having just come back from a late night supplement class at the local university, and I was ready to enjoy some peace and quiet. In the dusty bowels of the suburbs of Oklahoma City, you don’t really get many chances to sit on your porch and relax, with all of the sand blowing in your face and all. However, that night was a windless one, and I allowed myself to drift into the midst of the tranquil music. What I did not know was that this calming music would be the greatest contrast to what would be happening in the next hour, as in the far distance, a great thunderstorm rumbled with growing intensity, lightning passing back and forth between itself and the ground. And then, with clouds swirling and wind blowing, the first one landed.
2 All of a sudden, the radio stopped playing music. Thinking that the connection had broken up, I fiddled around with the antenna wire to find the signal. All of a sudden, the speaker blared into life, with an announcer speaking in a frantic tone. “Emergency warning! A tornado has just touched down 7 kilometres away from Oklahoma City. Everyone is to head to their tornado shelters immediately! I repeat,” Not another tornado! I thought. Oklahoma City was right in Tornado Alley, a tornado hotspot which stretched for a great deal, and encompassed the city. As I headed to the shelter carrying my radio and a few important things, the radio announcer spoke again: “Everyone living in tornado-proof houses must still go down to their shelters, as it is a super cluster of tornadoes and their combined force will overwhelm the house’s support beams. I repeat, everyone living in tornado-proof ……” All of a sudden, a string snapped in my mind, as I thought of my younger sister, Lily, who was having a sleepover at her friend, Angel van Clive’s mansion. It was tornado-proof, but as the announcer had stated, it wasn’t able to withstand the storm. Besides that, they also didn’t have a shelter……
3 Dropping my things, I sprinted to the driveway and jumped in through an open window. I started the car, and shot off towards Lily and her friend’s family.
4 As I blazed along the road in the direction of Angel’s house, I noticed I was also headed right towards the tornado. Only now did I truly understand why the announcer had said it was a super cluster of tornadoes. Five towering masses of swirling clouds funnelled to the ground from the dark clouds overhead. Around the tornadoes flew pieces of debris from the nearby farms that were caught in the path of destruction. All around me, families were popping out of their houses like rabbits running away from danger, headed towards their shelters. At this point, I was quaking with fear, but somehow the determination to drive on came to me.
5 As I was nearing the house, the car was pelted with hailstones freefalling from above. Smacking into the windows and breaking the glass, I had to keep on dodging the massive balls of ice the size of oranges. When I had finally gone up and over the lawn to the front door, I sprang out of the car and rushed through the doors to the sprawling mansion of a house. It was labyrinthine inside, and it took me awhile to find Lily, Angel and her family cowering in one corner. As I looked out of the window, what I saw shocked me. An entire truck was flying right towards us. I had just enough time to herd everyone out of the room when the truck collided, sending us flying. At this my mind shifted back to a lesson on meteorology we had a few months ago about tornadoes. My teacher had said that the wind from tornadoes wasn’t what killed so many people, but it was the debris that it carried which did that.
6 Just then, items of all sorts were sent flying through the windows beside us. Signposts, shovels, fencing and even an encyclopaedia had narrowly missed us. Soon we were out of the house, but to my horror the first tornado was already only five hundred metres away. Climbing into the car, we shot like a bullet down the street. However, the tornadoes were catching up steadily, and as I turned my head around, I saw the last of the Van Clive Mansion either getting sucked away or bombarded by “missiles”.
7 Just then, I noticed a new problem: slowly, but surely, the car was getting sucked up like the other unidentified objects zooming past us. We had barely enough down force from the tail on the back of the car to keep us from slipping off the tarmac. I had to push the pedal to the metal just to keep out of reach of the danger zone. Soon, we all saw my house nearby. Everyone unlocked their doors, and as I pulled up at the tornado shelter’s doors, we all jumped out. However, we all had no idea what disastrous events were just about to unfold.
8 As I opened the doors, I noticed that the car was beginning to rise, and it crashed through the top floor of the house. Now, without anything to block projectiles, glass, metal wood and other assortments flew like darts right for us. Picking up a wooden board, I just managed to cover ourselves. Then, I looked up in horror to see the tornadoes entrapping us with a fatal circle that grew closer and closer. Rushing everyone inside of the shelter, I managed to close the doors just as a wooden plank smacked into it, sending me flying across the shelter, and leaving a big dent in the metal sheeting.
9 For half-an-hour we sat in the shelter, waiting and listening, checking to see if the radio announcer had announced the all-clear signal. Finally, at the end of a long wait, the tornadoes had dispersed entirely and we were allowed to come out. The scene that lay before our eyes was horrid. Everywhere we looked, destruction and carnage was eminent. Most of the houses had been reduced to nothing, except for a lucky few that were just out of reach. Leaving a distinct trail of destruction, it was clear that the tornadoes had advanced to the city, knocked down ten skyscrapers, and then dispersed after destroying the Little League stadium. On the ground lay the remnants of the many houses that had once existed, sprawling with wooden floor boards, broken sheets of glass, metal signboards and wrecked cars. I could even see my car, mangled and peppered with debris about two hundred metres away. From the extent of the damage, I predicted that it would take probably years for Oklahoma to recover economically and physically. However, we were lucky, as we had escaped unharmed.
10 Two weeks later, I was commended by the police for my bravery in rescuing Lily, Angel and her family, despite the air of sadness that encircled everyone. At the end of the police lieutenant’s speech, everyone clapped together in joyous unison in appreciation of my astounding feat. I would never forget that incident, as it was one of my most joyous memories, even in the aftermath of disaster . (1248)