Sixty months, 1,825 days, 43,800 hours. It has been five years since a mile-and-a-half-wide tornado ripped through the heart of Tuscaloosa, Ala., the home of the Crimson Tide, on April 27, 2011. Since then, not a day has gone by without the sound of those terrifying winds haunting the memories of the storm's survivors.
On that fateful spring day, no one could have predicted what would happen during the weeks and years that would follow. In the moment, everything felt surreal; even now, the fear and the pain remain fresh. For those who walked through Tuscaloosa's rubble and devastation, life would never be the same.