BOWLING GREEN, Ky. — When a tornado touched down in Bowling Green, Kentucky, in the middle of the night, its violence was centered on one friendly subdivision.
It's a place where everyone waved at one another, and giggling children spent afternoons tooling around on bicycles on the sidewalks.
Fourteen people died in a few blocks. Eleven of them were from a single street. Entire families were lost. Between them were seven children. Two of those were infants.
Neighbors who survived are so stricken with grief they struggle to speak of it. All around them, amid the ruins, is evidence of the kids they used to watch climb off the school bus.
WHAS11 News has been in Bowling Green and in that particular neighborhood since Saturday. The stories are truly heartbreaking. Neighbors and strangers are coming to help them sort through the rubble.
The Warren County Coroner confirmed 15 people, including children lost their lives in the storm.
Many of them were in the Jennings Creek neighborhood, which officials called one of the hardest-hit areas of the city.
Liz Nelson doesn't live in the neighborhood, but works for a building company has been helping neighbors clear through the debris. Monday, her focus shifted to photos and memories.
“This is home and we just take care of your home," she said. "I just want to make sure I’m an active gospel witness and I don’t think there’s much thought to it you just get up and go.”
WHAS11 met Nelson while she was working at Vickie Boards' home. Boards and her husband huddled there during the storm. They lived, but their home is a total loss.
“He heard rumbling like a train,” Boards said of the storm. “The ceiling and stuff just started falling in on me."
Boards said she came back to look for pictures, especially those of her grandchildren, one of whom had heart surgery as a baby a few years ago.
“I have a lot of memories and pictures of him from the time he was born. And I found some of those," she said.
Nelson said even though Boards was a stranger until today, she couldn't imagine not helping.
“When somebody in the community is hurting you just rally around and help," she said. "The whole back of my trailer is just full of her pictures and I’m drying them out trying not to cry.”
PHOTOS | 7 children killed in one Bowling Green neighborhood
Boards said she and her husband have a safe place to stay with family.
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