|
|||||||||||||||||||
 |
PUBLICATIONS: Articles | Newsletter | Reports | Student Contributions | Videotapes
Spring 2001
by Katherine Lee Photo by Michael E. Palmer TUSCALOOSA, Ala. - It was a simple act of charity that propelled Mike Harris onto the front pages of newspapers and Web sites around the world. A day after a tornado killed at least 11 people in south Tuscaloosa, the Tuscaloosa News photo of Harris carrying a young girl away from the ruin of what was once her home because a symbol of the wide path of destruction the tornado tore through the city. Media outlets around the world searched Sunday for Harris and the girl he rescued, identified as 6-year-old Whitney Crowder. Whitney and her 3-year-old sister, Abby, remained in critical condition in a pediatric intensive care unit at Children's Hospital in Birmingham Sunday. They were two of four children transported from DCH Regional Medical Center to Children's Hospital Saturday. The body of Whitney's 16-month-old brother, Wesley, who had been missing after the tornado struck, was discovered in the rubble of the family trailer in the Bear Creek Trailer Park Sunday morning. Whitney's father, 26-year-old James Crowder, a former youth pastor, died in the tornado as well. Her mother, Theresa Crowder, 26, remained at UAB Medical Center Sunday in serious condition. The tornado barely missed Harris' nearby house as it wound its way through the trailer park, cutting a wide path. "My cousin called to tell me to turn on the news - I was watching a movie," Harris recalled. When he saw how close the tornado was coming toward the house, he ran across the street to bring a neighbor and her three children into his house to join his aunt, two cousins and grandmother under mattresses in the hallway and bathroom. "[The neighbor] nearly didn't make it in; with everything starting to fly around, I couldn't tell if it was her pounding on the door or stuff flying around," said Harris, 30. He barely had time to throw the door open, get her inside and put his own head under the mattress before the tornado hit, bringing a tree down into the front yard and a trampoline onto his car. "I just had it painted, too," he said. "Then I went around the hill and saw the houses gone, and I didn't worry about the car anymore." It was 'surreal,' Harris said. At one point, he had to pause for a moment to get his bearings because he didn't recognize his neighborhood anymore. "I've walked to that store so many times. I grew up here," he said. "And I was wondering, 'Which way is my house?' I had to stop and focus." Most of Harris' efforts went into directing emergency vehicles and pointing medical personnel to areas where people needed help. "I just made sure nobody was hurt and told people to watch for the power lines." He was doing that Saturday afternoon when he came upon a man carrying the badly injured Whitney to the main road, where rescue vehicles were waiting. "He couldn't carry her any more, so I took her and carried her to the front of the store," he said, referring to the D&G Grocery that lay in ruins at the corner of Bear Creek and Old Marion roads. "She was just moaning; I don't think she was conscious. "I just kept telling her, 'Everything's going to be all right; you're going to be OK.'" He was hampered by debris, downed power lines and an old back injury he sustained in a car accident three years ago. "It hurt to carry her; she was dead weight, but my concern was to get her to the ambulance, and I had to watch out for the power lines." Tuscaloosa News staff photographer Michael E. Palmer captured Harris carrying Whitney away from the rubble. The photograph, which ran on the front page of Sunday's Tuscaloosa News, was also transmitted around the world by the Associated Press. "I was surprised when I saw it," Harris said. "I just thought, 'Hey, I'm on the front page.' I thought it was neat he picked that photo out of all of them." He didn't know who Whitney was when he carried her away from the wreckage. "I just knew she lived in the trailer park. "She had a big cut on her leg. It looked about that long, although I don't know," Harris said, holding his hands about a foot apart. "And she had a big injury on her head. "I just wanted to get her out and try not to move her too much." He paused. "I'd like to meet her one day." When told of her condition and that of her family, Harris put his head in his hands. "I don't know what to say. There's nothing to say. "But what I was thinking after all this, is this song - it's a spiritual - about how in the midst of it all, it's a blessing." Assistant city editor Katherine Lee and staff photographer Michael E. Palmer work for The Tuscaloosa News in Tuscaloosa, Ala. They can be reached at katherine.lee@tuscaloosanews.com or michael.palmer@tuscaloosanews.com. | |
|||||||||||||||||
