Copyright © 1999 NLThomas
All Rights Reserved

Cherokee County, OK On June 1, 1999 a F3 twister hit a rural neighborhood in Cherokee County near Sequoyah State Park. 40 homes were destroyed along with Jerry and Sarah Haner's double-wide trailer. The Haner's have four children. Two people living in the home behind the Haner's home were killed. In Muskogee a second tornado damaged homes and a power plant.

According to the Haner's and Virgil Cunningham, a neighbor, there has been no luck in getting the Governor's Office and the Federal Emergency Management Administration to obtain disaster relief for the people of Cherokee County. They feel the strict focus on Moore, Del City and Mulhall is unfair. Tornados struck the Oklahoma City area on May 3.

Sarah Haner said that she was not a griper nor complainer and not trying to take anything away from the people in Del City, but she said, "It seems like they have everything flowing their way, and nothing is coming this way. If there is any way to send aid over here, I wish they would."

According to FEMA officials in Dallas, the rural area where Haner's home was did not qualify for Disaster relief. The FEMA officials told Cunningham that too many of the houses on Hickory Hills and Hammer Hill Road's were unoccupied lake houses and that not enough people were displaced.

According to Meredith Zehr, of the American Red Cross office in Wagoner, the tornado displaced 25 families and 85 houses were damaged. Jennifer Taylor of the Tulsa Area Chapter said that when combined with damage of the Muskogee tornado the total for the homes affected comes to 143. A relief shelter was set up at the Taylor Ferry lake area just outside Wagoner and according to Zehr, Red Cross volunteers served at least 900 meals everyday for two weeks after the Sequoyah Park storm.

Jamie Clinton, the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma's Business Director said that two bulldozers, dump trucks and a wood chipper have been donated to help in the cleanup efforts. 6 employees from the CNO Landfill have also been helping 4 home owners clear their land of debris. Clinton said that the CNO employees have been helping for three weeks and will continue to do so for about two more weeks. Clinton added that he had considered sending the crew to eastern Oklahoma when Moore and Del City was hit by tornados.

When the tornados hit eastern Oklahoma 44 people were killed and thousands of homes and businesses were either damaged or destroyed.