Minnesota Reeling From Twisters

By CBSNews.com staff CBSNews.com staff

March 30, 1998 / 9:23 AM EST / CBS

Powerful tornadoes cut a ragged swath of destruction across southern Minnesota, throwing a six-year-old boy to his death and injuring at least two dozen other people.

Dustin Schneider died Sunday afternoon when a twister blew his van off the road and into a muddy field near St. Peter. The force sucked the boy out of the van and tossed him 150 yards.

At least 27 people were treated in hospitals in Mankato and Springfield, and three were listed in critical condition.

Before dawn Monday, St. Peter firefighters made a door-to-door search in the damaged areas and found no additional victims. Authorities say this was because residents had advance warning. Some residents sought shelter 30-40 minutes before the twister hit, CBS News has learned.

The twisters flattened homes, uprooted trees, downed power lines and shattered windows in St. Peter and Le Center in south-central Minnesota and Comfrey in the southwestern portion of the state.

Downed power lines left most of the area in the dark and may have contributed to a surge of fires reported Sunday night and early Monday.

Governor Arne Carlson has sent the National Guard to both places and planned to tour the damaged areas Monday.

Brad Bencke, 25, of St. Peter, said he drove into the tornado on his way to an emergency shelter.

"It picked the car up about 3 feet in the air and it was shaking, not just levitating," Bencke said. The windows along the passenger side and the back blew out, wounding Bencke's 11-month-old child, who needed 10 stiches.

Dozens of homes and business were damaged in St. Peter, a town of about 10,000 people. Broken bricks littered the downtown area, trees were uprooted, storefronts were broken and the shattered contents of a boat store lay scattered over a six-block area. One metal shed looked as if it had been scrunched up like a tinfoil ball. Debris landed in the St. Paul suburbs, 55 miles away.

"We have broken glass pretty much everywhere," said Axel Steuer, president of Gustavus Adolphus College. Many buildings on the picturesque campus were also damaged, including the chapel, which lost its spire.

Justin Larson, who was driving through St. Peter when the twister hit, said the winds rammed a 5-foot street sign through the back of his car.

"I thought I was going to die," he said.

The tornado that struck St. Peter skipped about 10 miles northeast to Le Center and flattened 32 trailers in a mobile home park.

In Comfrey, a town of about 550 people, the fire station, the liquor store, a cafe and a church were completely demolished, and the school sustained heavy damage. Gas leaks forced residents to evacuate.

Tornadoes are rare in Minnesota in March. Craig Edwards of the National Weather Service said unseasonably warm weather produced by El Nino seemed the most logical explanation for Sunday's twistes.

Residents in the central Illinois town of Mattoon pulled together Sunday to clean up after a tornado ripped through town the day before, flattening at least 14 buildings, damaging more than 100 others and cutting power to some 5,000 homes and businesses. Three people, including a 9-year-old girl, were injured.