Less than 24 hours after a storm slammed the JDS Family Farm in Annville last Wednesday, fellow farmers, family members, and friends rallied to lend their neighbor a helping hand.
“That’s just how it works with the farming community,” said Joel Smith about the rapid response at the farm he owns along with his father, Dave, and grandfather, Robert. “If there’s an accident or a disaster, everybody is there immediately, ready to go. One farmer who we raise our heifers for saw the fire call go in for a tree on a house and he knew our address, so he called and texted asking if we needed any help.”
Smith said that the farmer was amazed by what he saw. Joel is the fifth generation of the Smith family to work the nearly 160 acres that comprise their two farms, which are adjacent to each other. He farms both properties that comprise JDS Family Farm along with his father, Dave, and grandfather, Robert.
Read More: National Weather Service confirms Wednesday night downburst in Annville
“I told him, ‘Yeah, yeah, I can use a hand,’ so he showed up and he was just in disbelief, couldn’t believe what he was coming to,” Smith said. “So he then called a neighbor and we got hold of another neighbor that we work with and it just spread. Everyone was like, ‘Hey, we need help here’ and then everybody just showed up and they also told everybody else.”
Between 20 and 30 individuals, including members of their church family at the Palmyra Church of the Brethren, were onsite on Thursday, the day after the storm. At least another half-dozen family members and close friends were there Friday morning continuing clean-up efforts. Smith said he expected about 12 helpers to assist before the end of the day.
Smith said quick action is the norm whenever a fellow farmer has a need.
“That’s how the farming community works around here, we all just pitch in and get things done,” added Smith. “When everybody can get together for a day, that’s all it takes. When you give that day, it doesn’t drag on for weeks and we all can get back to business.”
Those who came to assist didn’t come empty-handed, either.
“We had two telehandlers and maybe five skid loaders running around with grapples that were picking up limbs and wood,” said Joel. “The telehandlers allowed us to get up into trees and trim off those trees and sort through stuff.”
Dave said he took comfort in the storm’s wake with the knowledge that the farming community would turn out to assist his family.
“I had no doubts – when we saw the damage – I had no doubts that we would have a lot of people come to help us,” said Dave. “It’s just a statement about the farming community and how they stick together and help each other.”
Once word got out about the destruction, Joel said his phone and social media exploded.
“I’ve had so many messages, texts, emails, Facebook messages from the community and from our neighbors in the developments from around us asking about how they can help,” said Joel. “I haven’t had time to get to them and it’s not that I am not paying attention, but I haven’t needed any more help right now.”
Joel added he appreciates everyone who’s contacted him – even those neighbors who aren’t farmers. Locals have dropped off food and their church family and others delivered meals. Pizza was provided and a lady from their neighborhood purchased bottled water and delivered it for Thursday’s large work crew.
Read More: Fifth-generation JDS Family Farm is an island in a sea of local development
“Our neighbors say to let them know if we need anything. A lot of our neighbors in the development around us love having us here and they were worried about us,” said Joel. “We heard from a lot of people.”
One neighbor who responded was Palmyra resident Steve Bortner who stops and speaks with the family when he runs along Plaza Drive. He also purchases produce from the farm.
On Friday, Bortner was rolling a large, two-wheeled magnet over the ground to pick up nails and other metallic debris that was scattered around the property.
“The roof came off of this building (next to the main farmhouse) and it looks like it hit this tree and dropped all of the nails in the yard,” said Bortner. “I live up the road and we’re members of the same church… I’ve always had an affection for the Smith farm because they’re good people.”
Cole Stahr, who owns Jonestown-based Stahr Landscaping, said he’s known Joel since they were “little kids” and that they had shown cattle together in their youth.
Stahr took off work to help to gather down tree limbs and also get the beef calves into their appropriate outdoor hutches. During the brief but intense storm, many of the hutches were scattered downwind.
“I’m pretty much considered family and I know that they’d be there for me if I ever needed help with something like this, so I had the opportunity to spend the day and help out wherever I could,” said Stahr. “I grew up down the road from here and would spend all my summers on the farm.”
Greyson Smith, Joel’s cousin, said that he was also reared nearby and spent his free time when he was younger on the farm. Smith and Stahr were laboring together on Friday on clean-up detail, addressing the remaining smaller items that needed to be removed among other odd but necessary jobs.
Greyson Smith, who works for Land of Lakes, has some experience in dealing with storm damage to farm property. He had visited a member farmer in Cochranville earlier in the day on Friday before coming to North Londonderry Township after that Chester County-based property was also hit by a tornado last week.
“I grew up on the farm when that building (the hay shed) was put up in the first place and now it is going to have to be rebuilt,” said Greyson. “It’s just weird how it ( a storm) works. It just takes some, leaves some and just pushes through.”
The National Weather Service, in conjunction with assistance from the Lebanon County Department of Emergency Services, issued a report concerning the storm that read, “straight line winds estimated at 70 to 80 mph… snapped a pine tree, causing it to fall into a farmhouse, causing significant damage. Wind also entered a large barn, ultimately leading to the roof being ripped off, with debris carried up to 125 yds downstream toward ENE. A trailer, a wagon, and other farm equipment were flipped or damaged due to the wind. The footprint of maximum wind damage measured 350 yds long by 200 yds wide.”
The NWS called the storm a downburst and noted that the winds were equivalent to an EF-0 tornado.
Downbursts are ground-level wind systems that can emerge from a thunderstorm, when a column of air rapidly descends and then hits the ground, spreading outward and dispersing strong, damaging winds.
The downburst sheared four grown trees, shredding some like fire wood. A roof for a hay shed was completely destroyed and one of those tree’s top flew into the air, traveled about 10 to 15 yards and landed on an extension to the second farmhouse, delivering what the NWS said was significant damage.
That home also sits on the family farm and was in the storm’s path. The main farmhouse, which was occupied by Smith’s wife and two children at the time of the storm, received no damage.
Fortunately, no one was injured during the brief weather event. An aunt and uncle who live in the second farmhouse that was damaged weren’t home when the storm hit shortly after 6 p.m. Wednesday.
Furthermore, none of the farm’s 65 cattle were killed and damage to their field crops was minimal. One calf suffered a minor injury.
“That was definitely the best-case scenario, nobody was hurt,” said Smith. “The only thing was building damage and, you know, buildings get rebuilt.”
Joel said he was in the family’s beef store during the height of the storm.
“It was just a wild thing, it grew pretty quickly and the heavy rain came out of nowhere and there was a white wall where you couldn’t see anything,” said Smith. “It was gone in a few seconds and after it was gone, I looked out the window and saw things missing, I saw trees down, I explored more and saw all of the damage.”
He had walked over to their produce stand that sits next to their store, then took shelter in the building that houses their business.
“I had walked over to clean off the produce wagon ahead of the rain because I knew some rain was coming, it was 6 p.m. and I knew no more people would be coming,” said Smith. “Until I got over there, it started raining enough that I didn’t want to stand out, so I went inside to wait it out because it didn’t look like it was going to be that much.”
Unlike storms with high winds, Joel said the typical train-like sound that accompanies them was absent from this one.
“It was just the rain and the wind blowing on the doors is what I heard, I didn’t hear too much else,” recalled Joel. “A neighbor who lives down the road stopped by last night and she said they heard the train sound, but I didn’t hear anything like that. The rain and wind blowing on the doors was too loud.”
Firefighters and farmers who arrived on scene shortly after the storm’s aftermath immediately began to assist Smith.
“Farming neighbors were out here catching calves and the firefighters were out here catching them and bringing them over,” said Joel, who added that farmers brought along tarps to cover exposed hay from further water damage.
The fact that a devastating tornado in Campbelltown that occurred 20 years ago nearly to the same day as this storm was not lost on Smith, who called the timing “crazy.” About two miles separates the site of the Campbelltown storm and the Smith property.
In the wake of this storm, Joel said viewing the damage that night and the next morning was an emotional experience. The 300 yards the downburst traveled was about the length of his entire property.
“Wednesday evening, after I went inside and settled in, it was pretty heavy, I got a little worked up,” said Joel. “Yesterday, when I went out to get my work done, get the cattle fed, get my bearings straight with the calves because I have them in order… as I worked around all of the mess and rubble, it was hard. It was hard and pretty heavy for me. And then everyone showed up and it was just a sigh of relief and a great feeling.”
Questions about this story? Suggestions for a future LebTown article? Reach our newsroom using this contact form and we’ll do our best to get back to you.
Free news isn’t cheap. If you value the journalism LebTown provides to the community, then help us make it sustainable by becoming a champion of local news. You can unlock additional coverage for the community by supporting our work with a one-time contribution, or joining as a monthly or annual member. You can cancel anytime.
More Top Stories
Something went wrong. Please refresh the page and/or try again.
