A Man Built A Strange ‘Contraption’ In His Backyard That Ended Up Saving His Family’s Life

Justin hadn’t been prepared. In fact, practically no one in Bremen, Kentucky, had seen this coming. It was December, and tornadoes rarely pop up that late in the year. But the Pointer family couldn’t deny what was heading their way. And they and their neighbors were forced to face the ultimate nightmare before Christmas.

At least there was one less person in the house to worry about. Justin’s stepson Gage was spending time with his dad, Jordan, and they weren’t in Bremen. Hopefully they’d miss the tornado completely. But Justin still had to get the other seven folks in the home to safety — not to mention their couple of dogs. What should he do?

Perhaps Justin’s first clue should have been the unseasonably warm weather. On that day, the mercury rose to a sweltering 73 °F in Kentucky — and remember, this was in December! But while Kentuckians basked in the heat, one man wasn’t so quick to celebrate.

Pat Spoden works for the National Weather Service in Paducah, and he was more than a little perplexed by the high temperature. He knew that it shouldn’t have been that hot heading into the festive season. And unlike his neighbors, he definitely wasn’t appreciating it.

In fact, Pat couldn’t shake an uncomfortable sensation from the pit of his stomach. “I’ve been doin’ this for 34 years. You have that gut feeling like, ‘This is not good. It’s not gonna be a good day,’” he told CBS News. And given the decades of experience Pat had under his belt, his instincts were to be trusted.

Unfortunately, Kentucky was among the ten states affected by the coming storm — and its several dozen tornadoes. But before it all came to a head, Pat decided he had to act. Using his weather service access, he sent out a grave warning to the folks in one small Kentucky city.

Mayfield looked as though it was in the path of one of those tornados. And while anyone watching the weather forecasts would have known a twister was on its way, Pat had to reach every person possible in the city. On the evening of December 10, he put together his ominous message — then sent it out.

Alerts popped up on phones reading, “You are in a life-threatening situation. Mobile homes will be destroyed. Considerable damage to homes, businesses, and vehicles is likely, and complete destruction is possible.” Terrifying stuff. And sadly, both Mayfield and Bremen were hit hard.

The big tornado that hit Kentucky was measured as a four on the Enhanced Fujita Scale. That’s almost as bad as it can get. Basically, you’re looking at winds of around 166 to 200 miles per hour. They’re absolutely devastating. But that wasn’t the scariest part of all this.

Worryingly, some of the people who were supposed to be prepped for this weren’t. Jason Mitchell admitted as much when he spoke to the Federal News Network in February 2022. He’s part of the Verizon Crisis Response Team, which helps with telecommunications during emergency events.

Mitchell justified this lack of preparation by saying, “It was an unusual time for any type of tornadic activity. In December, we don’t think of that as being a time that we’re going to be affected with the type of weather that’s going to cause any type of damage. Generally, it’s going to be a freeze, blizzards, bomb cyclones.” 

“[But] this [tornado] was one that kind of crept up on us,” Mitchell continued. “It was on the ground for nearly three hours, tracking 160 miles in total. What was so bad about this was the areas that were hit were very rural.” No, this thing wasn’t over in a matter of minutes.

How destructive can tornadoes be at their worst? The National Severe Storms Library has some bad news. According to its website, cars may be picked up and flung through the air. And your house? That could be torn to pieces. It isn’t a pretty picture.

Even if you’re sheltering away from cars and houses, you have to watch out for any flying glass shards or rubble. Tornadoes have ripped sidewalks apart as well — further proving their horrifying power. In a nutshell, you’re best getting far, far away from the worst storms.

The tornado facing Justin and his family looked horrible indeed. If Pat’s warning was correct, they could be in real danger. But it was too late to flee. Could they sit tight and ride the whole thing out? And what could Justin do to help keep his loved ones alive?

We wouldn’t have blamed Justin for feeling scared, as his home didn’t have the kind of basement he and his family could hide in safely. Gage may have been terrified, too — even though he was outside Bremen with his dad. His mom was still in the city, and that meant she was at real risk.

But Justin refused to panic. Instead, he remembered what his dad had done a few years back. His father had installed a prefabricated bunker — 10 feet deep and 12 feet wide — in the yard. Could this possibly be their salvation?

Reflecting on that nerve-jangling night, Justin said to WHAS-TV, “[I] started getting everybody down [into the underground shelter] about the time [when the tornado] was in Madisonville.” In case you weren’t aware, that city is less than 20 miles away from Bremen.

Who was in that small shelter? Justin reeled off a long list to the TV station. “It was eight in total,” he recalled. “It was me, my father, my nephew, his girlfriend, my wife, my two kids, and our grandmother.” Oh, and, of course, they didn’t forget the dogs. Talk about a tight fit!

Justin’s dad had still made a wise decision all those years ago. A prefabricated bunker is not only easy to install — as the name suggests, you don’t need to construct it yourself — but it can also be cheaper than a DIY job. There’s just one thing to keep in mind, though.

Regardless of how resilient the bunker may be against the elements, the ground around it has to be just as sturdy. If it’s not, there’s a good chance it won’t protect you or your family in a time of crisis. That’s important to know if you want to follow in Justin’s dad’s footsteps.

And while you could build a bunker for yourself inside your home, make certain you’re up to the job or otherwise hire a contractor. It’s a major project! You can even transform a pre-existing room on your property into a shelter. Just be sure to choose wisely.

That space should only have one entrance, and it needs to be windowless. You don’t want any glass flying around... But here’s the kicker. The foundations for that room have to be made even stronger to help withstand the worst weather, and that can be a very expensive job.

So, did Justin’s dad make the right choice going with a prefabricated shelter? You bet. While space inside was clearly limited, it did its job in keeping the family safe from the twister. But that’s not to say things didn’t get a little hairy at one point.

“[The tornado] started shaking the lid real bad [when it crossed over]. We had to hold it down,” Justin said to WHAS-TV. “This also provided a shelter for us after the storm was already gone, because, I mean, it was raining, windy, [and] cold.”

Then, once the storm had finally passed, Justin and his loved ones filed out of the shelter — only to make a heartbreaking discovery. The tornado had left destruction in its wake, and that included inflicting substantial damage to the Pointers’ home.

Jordan told WHAS-TV, “I mean, it was [like] a war zone.” And you can’t say he was exaggerating. Debris littered the area as far as the eye could see, while the trees around the Pointers stood bent and broken. Nearly 60 people lost their lives in Kentucky as a result of the natural disaster.

And if folks had been hoping to contact loved ones to see whether they were safe, they may have been out of luck. “As [the tornado] hit that night, quite a bit of infrastructure was affected — whether it be landline through our telecom providers or… our existing towers,” Jason Mitchell admitted to the Federal News Network. “We’ve seen towers that looked like someone reached up and pulled them to the ground.”

Mitchell also made a sobering point. “We have multiple regions,” he added. “A lot of people hear about the damage from Hurricane Laura and Hurricane Ida down in the Louisiana area, but they really don’t think about what it did to West Virginia. We [had] to get to communities that were underwater because of that same storm. The same is true for a tornado.”

Overall, 90 people died and over 15,000 buildings were leveled during the tornado outbreak in the U.S. This made it the worst ever weather event of its kind for December when it comes to loss of life. And Justin and his family must have been counting their blessings. Without the prefab shelter, their names could very well have joined that tragic list.

That made the bunker worth its weight in gold. Justin said to WHAS-TV, “You know, [my] dad doesn’t really remember exactly how much it cost, but he said he’d pay a hundred times more for it right now. I recommend everyone to get one. Because if you have nowhere to go, this is perfect.”