by Bobby Akart
Before his death in 1815, Squire Boone Jr. was instrumental in establishing Corydon as the second capital of the Indiana Territory. When he died, he was buried in a cave on the southern end of his property near Mauckport, later known as Squire Boone Caverns and considered one of the most spectacular underground caves in the Eastern United States.
The Boone family remained in Harrison County, buying up large swaths of land along the Ohio River stretching from what is now known as the O’Bannon Woods State Park to the north, across Indian Creek down to the tiny town of New Amsterdam, and beyond. Today, the town, population twenty-seven, has a general store, a Baptist church, a Methodist church, a town hall, and a cemetery.
The Boone family grew over the years, and most moved away. Now that the pioneer days were over, Squire, the fifth of his family name, and his wife of forty years, Sarah, made a living off the land. Their property was used for farming, raising livestock and poultry, but mainly, they were known for their apple orchard.
That’s where Sarah’s pedigree adds to the Boones’ family history.
Before she married Squire, Sarah was a Chapman, from the John Chapman family tree. Now, most people didn’t know that John Chapman was the real name of an American folk hero—Johnny Appleseed.
Johnny Appleseed, or John Chapman, as most people in the upper Midwest knew him during the early eighteen hundreds, was a pioneer of a different sort. While the Boone family spent their time fighting their way West and establishing settlements, John Chapman became an American legend, introducing apple trees to large parts of Pennsylvania, Ohio, Illinois, and Indiana.
He spent his final years in Fort Wayne, Indiana, and many of his family members settled on both sides of the Ohio River separating Southeast Indiana from the Louisville, Kentucky, area.
The Boone family had an impressive apple orchard on their farm long before Squire and Sarah had met. She happened to be visiting family in Indianapolis one year when the Indiana State Fair was taking place. She and Squire met one another on the Midway. His charming smile and gentlemanly ways led them to dating. They married after just six months of courtship and, soon thereafter, had their first child, Kristi.
Two years later, Sarah gave Squire a son. He was so honored to have a boy that he thanked his wife by naming him after her family—Chapman Boone. Then, despite the Boones and the Chapmans having a legacy of large families, they found themselves unable to get pregnant again, not that it mattered. Squire and Sarah loved each other dearly, and they were more than proud to raise their two kids to be impressionable young adults.
Then, one day, a surprise was bestowed upon the Boone family. Sarah discovered that she was pregnant once again. Words like miracle and surprise were used to describe the unexpected baby. Sarah, who’d always been religious, declared her pregnancy to be a blessing from God, so when another son was born into the Boone family, a name was readily agreed upon.
Levi, the name of the third son of Jacob as told in the Bible, became the apple of the Boone family’s eye. With two much older siblings preparing to go to college, Levi became somewhat of a family mascot. Everyone joined in raising him and worked overtime to impart their knowledge to the young boy.
Squire taught him how to grow food and hunt. Sarah taught him how to mind his manners. Kristi taught him a love of animals. Chapman taught him how to risk his life. All in all, Levi grew up a well-rounded kid.
In recent years, despite the fact that Squire was in his early sixties, he decided to expand Riverfront Farms, a name he adopted after his father passed away and left the entire operation to him nearly four decades ago.
Until that time, the property had been referred to as Boone’s Farm. Although Squire was proud of being a Boone and his family’s legacy, he grew to despise the name—Boone’s Farm. He was constantly teased about it from grade school until he graduated high school to work the orchards, the Boones’ real moneymaker.
After his father passed, he was given control of the farm operations at an early age. A few years later, after his mother passed, he and Sarah married.
Squire approached Sarah about changing the name to Chapman Farms. She disagreed, saying it would be a dishonor to the Boone family’s history. She, too, however, was tired of folks asking her if they made wine there.
To be sure, Sarah Chapman Boone made the best apple wine in the tristate area, but she deeply resented being associated with the malt-based swill that was the drink of choice of fourteen-year-olds and prostitutes.
Since most of their land stretched along the Ohio River in Southeast Indiana, Riverfront Farms seemed appropriate, and the Boone property was so named.
Squire made his way to the television, which was rarely played in the Boone household. They, like so many others, had unplugged from society and sought to live a simpler life, one that was uncluttered with the drama of others, especially strangers.
He turned it on at Kristi’s behest and quickly found The Weather Channel, which was programmed as one of their favorites. Not just because Chapman was frequently on air, but they hoped that one day, the local Weather on the 8’s would reveal that their prayers for rain would be answered, ending what became known as Dust Bowl II, the never-ending drought.
Squire was about to sit in his recliner to see what all the hoopla was, and immediately jumped to attention. He glanced over his shoulder to see where Sarah was before he turned up the volume, but only loud enough for him to hear. She’d suffered from bouts of anxiety of late, and he didn’t need to heap any more on her shoulders—especially the death of her son playing out on television.
Chapter 11
Overlooking Elliott Bay
Pier 56
Seattle, Washington
During Chapman’s days as a storm chaser, a common joke among his peers when attempting to misdirect one another was to say we’ll see you in Seattle. There was a good reason storm chasers never had Seattle on their must-visit lists—they’d be very bored.
The National Weather Service kept detailed records of the number of severe thunderstorm warnings each of its regional offices issued. Routinely, Seattle was the only NWS office in the continental U.S. with no severe thunderstorm warnings.
To be classified as a severe thunderstorm, conditions must exist that include at least fifty-eight-mile-per-hour straight-line winds, those created from intense downdrafts associated with heavy rain, and the possibility of accompanying hail of an inch in diameter. Technically, a tornado would be classified as a severe storm, but the Seattle metro area hadn’t had one of those since 1962.
The cool breezes off the Pacific Ocean acted as a moderating force that prevents thunderstorms from developing by mitigating their strength. Things had changed, however. The Pacific Northwest was going through an identity crisis, weather-wise. Cold air from Canada was now being greeted with unusually warm air coming from California and off the Pacific Coast. This odd coupling for the region had caused the unusually rainy weather and, now, significant levels of convection.
Chapman had seen the cumulus clouds rapidly drawing together at the end of his last segment. As the skies darkened, he heard the low rumble of thunder in the distance. In the minutes that followed, his surroundings changed drastically.
He walked away from the production team and made his way to the northernmost end of Pier 56. He was momentarily hypnotized by the steady turn of the Great Wheel taking the sightseer-filled gondolas through their revolutions.
Then lightning struck past Bainbridge Island up toward Puget Sound. And then there was another strike. Suddenly, Chapman sensed trouble. The winds began to pick up and the clouds obscured any semblance of daylight, bringing a darkness over Seattle that resembled the onset of dusk.
Others around him noticed the sudden change in the atmospheric conditions as well. The crowd of onlookers who’d gathered to watch his broadcast appeared confused and frozen in place. A few began to wander inside the building out of concern.
More lightning stitched the sky, but closer this time, striking
near Kingston to his northwest. The sky filled with high-level static discharge as cloud-to-cloud lightning filled the sky, creating an incredible light show. Chapman, however, knew it was a precursor of things to come. He’d seen it before.
He ran back to the producer. “Let me have your cell phone.”
“Chapman, we have to go back on air in three minutes,” the producer responded as she fumbled through her backpack in search of the device.
“Give me your phone!” Chapman demanded, expressing his need for urgency. She handed it to him, and he placed a call to his research assistant in Atlanta.
When she answered, he dispensed with the pleasantries. “Holly, pull up the radar for Seattle. Quick!”
“What’s wrong, boss?” she asked as she pounded away on the keyboard.
“We’ve got a supercell developing.”
“That’s impossible. You’re in Seattle.”
Chapman stuck the cell phone between his shoulder and his chin. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a dollar bill and began to tear it into tiny pieces. The wind was blowing much stronger from Elliott Bay onto the waterfront, but that was not concerning him. He looked up once again.
“Holly! Come on! We’ve got counter-rotation.”
The Weather Desk producer was now chattering in his earpiece about his upcoming segment. He motioned for the producer to join his side. When she arrived, he brusquely grabbed her arm and pulled her out of earshot of the frenzied crowd, who’d gathered along the rail of Pier 56 to watch the lightning show.
“Listen to me,” Chapman began. “Under no circumstances should you guys risk your safety. Tell the Weather Desk that this news story has changed. You should go inside and take cover.”
“Risk? Safety? From what?” The producer, a native of Seattle, was confused.
The cameraman, who stood nearby and overheard Chapman, chimed in, “No way, man. I’m from Oklahoma. I live for this shit.”
The clouds began to show flashes of lightning inside them, periodically lighting up as if the hand of God was turning on and off a light switch.
Chapman turned to the producer. “Are you staying?”
“Um …” She hesitated.
“I am!” said the Oklahoman gleefully.
“Well, okay,” replied the young producer, her voice full of doubt.
Chapman looked her in the eye. His glare was intense. “All right, if you’re with me, then stay with me. But if I say take cover, you do it. Got it?”
“Got it.”
Chapman slowly walked away and looked skyward. He took the cell phone with his left hand and the tiny pieces of the dollar bill in his right. At first, they held in the palm of his hand until, slowly at first, they lifted into the air. Straight up into the air, over his head until they were sucked into the sky.
He yelled into the phone, “We have counter-rotation! They need to issue a tornado warning. Look at the radar, Holly!”
A massive lightning strike hit downtown Seattle. And then another struck the Space Needle, sending sparks flying in all directions. A thunderous boom hit Bainbridge Island, causing Chapman to spin around to determine its source.
Then he saw it. A prominent, circular, light-colored disk appeared on the surface waters of Elliott Bay, surrounded by a larger dark area, clearly different from the now choppy bay.
Beads of sweat poured out of his forehead as he stared at the disk. His eyes grew wide and he pulled the cell phone away from his ear.
“Be wrong. Please be wrong.”
Chapter 12
Overlooking Elliott Bay
Pier 56
Seattle, Washington
Chapman wasn’t wrong. He knew tornadic activity, and he also knew Seattle’s history. In 1962, the first recorded tornado by NOAA in the Western Washington region occurred in Seattle at the childhood home of Bill Gates, cofounder of Microsoft. As families gathered around the television, prepared dinner, or while kids were playing, dark clouds had gathered in northeast Seattle.
The tornado struck the View Ridge neighborhood before crossing Lake Washington and hitting the Eastside area of the city. Trees were uprooted, car windows were smashed, and roofs were ripped off dwellings.
One of the victims was six-year-old Bill Gates, who became concerned for his bicycle. Just as he was about to go outside to retrieve it, the tornadic winds swept under the roof of his family’s carport and threw it over their home. The carnage caused walls inside their house to crack and parts of their roof to crash into the neighbor’s house. The winds associated with the ’62 tornado approached a hundred miles an hour.
As if watching in slow motion, Chapman focused on the colored disks on the surface water. A pattern of light- and dark-colored spirals developed on the outer ring of the disk.
Another one caught his eye. Farther south, near the ferry approaching from Bainbridge Island. Chapman wiped the sweat mixed with drops of rain off his forehead.
There are two now. Sisters.
The first sister was born. A dense annulus of sea spray, a ring known as a cascade, had formed around the dark spot. Chapman could make out a clearly defined eye forming.
“Roll camera!” he shouted to the cameraman and pointed toward the center of Elliott Bay just west of Centennial Park. Then he shouted into the phone, “Holly! Where are the tornado sirens?”
“I’ve got ’em on the other line. They’re analyzing—”
Chapman cut her off. “I can see the damned thing forming!”
He’d barely finished his sentence when the waterspout became a visible funnel from the water surface to the overhead cloud. The spray vortex rose several hundred feet in the air and widened at the top.
“Are you getting this?” asked the producer, as she was now hyped up with excitement. Behind her, onlookers were screaming in panic, running for cover in the building or their parked cars.
“On it!” replied the cameraman. They were all yelling at one another now to be heard over the chaos around them.
“Holly! Sirens?”
The second sister formed.
“We’re live!” shouted the producer over the shouts and screams.
“Sisters!” Chapman began the report without setting the scene. The visual of two massive waterspouts barely three miles away from where they stood on Pier 56 overlooking the bay was all the viewers needed to understand what was happening. “We’ve got two fully developed tornadic waterspouts in Elliott Bay off Seattle’s waterfront. Moments ago, a clearly defined eye formed over the bay, and now a mature vortex has emerged, visible from the surface of the water to the dark clouds overhead.
“They are impressive in size and strength. I’m estimating the diameter of the two sisters to be two to three hundred feet, stretching around four hundred feet into the air. Stubby, but powerful. The low cumulus cloud cover that suddenly formed is providing added energy to these monsters.”
Another loud boom of thunder drowned out Chapman’s words, causing screams to be heard throughout the waterfront. People were running for their lives as the waterspouts slowly churned their way eastward toward the once-bustling entertainment venue.
“People are scrambling for cover, but there are some who are directly in the path of the sister waterspouts,” Chapman continued to report. “I don’t have access to the data, but based on the waves being generated, I suspect very strong winds in excess of a hundred miles per hour are providing the fuel for these two waterspouts to maintain this level of intensity.”
He was now shouting into the microphone.
“These two tornados formed over water rapidly. A supercell, a severe thunderstorm evidenced by a deep, persistently rotating updraft, developed in a matter of minutes. There was no warning. It was not forecasted. And now thousands of lives are at risk.”
Chapter 13
Elliott Bay
Seattle, Washington
The lead pack of advanced kayakers flew across the choppy waters of Elliott Bay in a group of seventeen. Most of them knew one another, and prior t
o starting the race, they’d discussed the hazards of kayaking alone on the open water when pleasure craft were out in force. You could see a freighter or a cruise ship coming and adjust your course. Runabouts and Jet Skis, however, couldn’t always see you. Oftentimes, they were deemed the distracted drivers of the waterways.
The frontrunner, a broad-shouldered man in the snug cockpit of his Epic-brand kayak, seemed at one with his wooden craft as he flew across the waters as if he’d been shot out of a cannon. The rest of the pack paddled furiously to keep pace, hoping that he’d wear himself out after they made the turn around the floating cones dropped into the water by the race organizers.
He dipped his paddles into the water with a methodical, trained motion, concentrating the power of his brawny arms into precise, fluid strokes that kept the kayak propelling through the slight chop. Adrenaline fueled his body, and Metallica blared “Enter Sandman” through his AirPods, which helped pump his adrenaline.
He gulped the salty air into his lungs and managed a smile as he continued to lead the pack. Up ahead in the distance, he could make out the Seattle-Bainbridge ferry travelling across Elliott Bay. It provided him a point of reference upon which to focus, as the darkening skies had somewhat obscured the Olympic Mountains in the distance.
The race continued and he caught a glimpse of a challenger. He was so intent on absorbing the music and concentrating on each stroke to make it perfect that he’d forgotten that he was not alone. He glanced over his shoulder. The pack had pulled away a considerable distance from the hundred or so kayakers who were simply satisfied to compete and finish. Many of the stragglers were heavy, fiberglass, double-cockpit kayaks that carried a couple, or a parent and a grown child. They were safe and stable, but no match for the thoroughbreds at the front of the pack.