Storm could've been much worse

It’s small comfort if you are one of those 11 families whose homes were destroyed Sunday or among the 16 families whose homes suffered major damage, but it could have been worse.

A lot worse.

Consider these mitigating factors:

•It happened in daylight.

•It happened on a weekend. Our guess is that a significant percentage of Jay County’s population was paying at least marginal attention to the Indianapolis Colts game, so they saw the National Weather Service warnings and were able to act.

•The sirens did their job. Even if you were smart enough not to watch the Colts game, you received a warning if you lived within earshot of the fire departments’ siren systems.

•The route of the twister across the county steered clear of centers of population. It was close, at times. There’s some evidence that the tornado’s fury entered the county within a mile of Miller’s Merry Manor, the nursing home just outside of Dunkirk. And its course across the center of the county managed to miss Portland and Bryant.

Again, that’s small comfort if you happen to live on county road 300 North. But the fact is, it could have been worse.

No lives were lost. No injuries were sustained. And those whose property was damaged managed to be philosophical about it.

They’ve seen plenty of other disasters in the past few months: A flurry of hurricanes and terrifying wildfires.

So Sunday’s pain was accepted with a sense of perspective. Everyone knew that it could have been worse. — J.R.