Students, Alumni, Locals Come Together After Tornado

Emily Mosier photo

Residences on Elm Street suffer from roof damage following storm.

Residents, students and alumni are continuing to volunteer their time and effort in helping those in Troy and other Alabama towns who were devastated by an EF-2 tornado on March 15.

Several Southern and Midwestern states saw severe damage that weekend after a series of destructive storms and tornados moved across state lines. In Alabama, three people were killed. While there were no deaths or injuries in Troy, several business were damaged and the neighborhood on Elm street sustained severe damage, with hundreds of trees falling down and one house losing its roof.

The entire Troy Trojans baseball team volunteered to help clear debris from Elm Street, including fallen limbs and picking up broken glass.

“Coach Mead tells us we need to embody family, and that’s what we want to show the community and anybody who lives here,” said baseball catcher Brooks Bryan, a junior sports management major from Opelika, Alabama. “Once you’ve been in troy for a while you meet a lot of people and there is a family atmosphere to this town.

“Helping is always a big deal for me, and our team, and we felt the need to really help out the community.”

Autumn Parrish also sprang into action to help. Parrish, who graduated from Troy in December with a degree in Risk Management and Insurance, raised $955 for tornado relief via GoFundMe and social media.

She helped distribute the funds to those who lost their homes and those who needed medical and recovery supplies. Additionally, Parrish was involved in collecting donations, including from the bookstore where she worked. She ultimately helped distribute supplies, that filled up two vehicles, to the towns of Troy, Banks and Ebenezer.

Parrish, who is also a trained storm spotter with the National Weather Service, said she watched the tornado approach Troy via radar until the storm disrupted the internet.

“I thought we were going to open the closet to find nothing out there . . . I looked back at everything after the storms and as it turned out, that storm miraculously failed to produce a tornado until it was just past us,” Parrish said. “We were so lucky that me and my sister, Lacy, agreed immediately that we'd go help as soon as we could.

“Neither of us are huggers but we clung to each other for dear life after all that. We promised we'd help. If it didn't hit us directly, then we have the means to do something.” 

Parrish said that she grew up in a military family and was subsequently in Louisiana when Hurricane Katrina devastated the state; she saw her hometown of Selma, Alabama, sustain serious tornado damage in 2023; and in 2018, she was only 30 minutes away from a serious tornado in Jacksonville, Florida. These experiences, and her knowledge of insurance, have helped her understand the importance of communities coming together.

“It takes a lot of time for federal aid and even state aid to get out to people,” Parrish said.

“People can't wait for tarps when the insurance adjusters come well before any substantial help.

“When you get storm damage, you have to act pretty much as soon as it's safe to prevent further damage or you can consider your claim null and void . . . I can't sit and do nothing. Some of my earliest memories are disaster relief. My parents instilled in me from a very young age that those who are able should serve those who are impacted.”

Don Wambles is the disaster relief coordinator for the Salem Troy Association, which is part of the Alabama Disaster Relief Association. He was among those who responded immediately to help Elm Street, which was part of the neighborhood where he lived.

“I cannot tell you how many total volunteers we've had today,” Wambles said. “There's probably been a hundred, I'm guessing roughly, and my team has twelve.

“It's just gets you overwhelmed with gratitude. That's the only way to express it.”

Other Troy-based organizations who have helped include The Church of the Highlands, Troy Resilience project, Troy Salvation Army and Troy Animal Rescue Project.