Vicki and Jim Ferguson sit in their travel trailer and unfinished home. Recently back in Texas after living and raising children in Washington. Vicki hangs out in the travel trailer while Jim sits in the house keeping an eye on the weather and storm but not expecting much eventfulness. 

It was a busy weekend in this sleepy East Texas area with hundreds of thousands of people visiting the very popular First Monday Trade Days happening in neighboring Canton but Jim and Vicki Ferguson's day was a quite one. 

Reports of a tornado at Interstate 20 and Farm to Market 17 flood the airways and news stations. The EF4 tornado had just destroyed the Dodge dealership and Yesterland Farm in Canton with sustained winds of 175 miles an hour. Meteorologists say the storms were headed North towards the small town of Fruitvale, Texas and the Ferguson homestead. 

The weatherman said the storm was headed north but Jim knew there was a strong chance that the tornado could move north-east, missing the house. Typically twisters don't travel in a straight path but tend to veer East. 

As the sirens went off and the lights went out, Jim knew his instinct was wrong. He stepped out of their house to look at the dark, green, ominous sky, barley visible around the mile long tornado in the sky. 

As the dark ominous form of the twister fills the sky,  Jim could see debris floating in the air but it was like something out of a movie, they didn't seem real. 

His other senses began to regard the tornado and the reality of the situation became deadly. The ground began to shake and the train-like rumble of the tornado was defining. The pressure in the air was tangible and the smell of rain and dust from the tornado's destructive path was in the air all around. He knows they need to take cover NOW. He had seen the damage the Dodge dealership experienced and knew it was going to be bad. 

Jim took all this in within the span of seconds. 

Jim heads from the house to their temporary home, a travel trailer, to fetch Vicki and bring her into the protection of the structure. Quickly he dismissed the idea of heading for the car and trying to outrun the tornado. While good in theory, he knew they did not have time and tornadoes can be unpredictable with erratic twists and turns. 

They get to the house, close to safety, but can't help but stop and stare in amazement at the living, breathing storm heading for their home. They had recently moved and their lives, their livelihood, was all on this property directly in the tornado's path. 

As they entered the house they headed for the bed and, moving in unison, climbed in between the mattress and box-spring. 

The already impossibly loud rumble of the tornado grew continually louder as it approached the house. Vicki and Jim could do nothing but hide and wait as the twister destroyed their home. Almost nothing. Vicki knows of the power of God and that this was all his plan. Holding him to his word, she shouted over the roar of the tornado "God you brought us here for a reason!". 

As the tornado grew closer and inevitably bore down on top of them, the rumbling, freight-like sound changed to a screaming something compared to a wildcat's cry. 

The mattress they had over their heads for protection was ripped off by the force of the tornado and Vicki was knocked unconscious. It was in this moment that Jim realized he could feel the rain and understood the roof was gone.  

Jim had fear but knew what was happening and knew his only role was to try to protect himself and his wife and survive the storm. 

"Its amazing how much you can remember from the span of 10 seconds" Jim says. 

The Fergusons never regarded this as a simple storm. They insist it was like the Tornado was alive with multiple elements working together to create a living organism with a life cycle.  

As Jim realized the house was destroyed, the eye of the tornado past over. Jim was still conscious and remembers looking up into the belly of the beast. The air was calm and still, the rain had ceased. Is this the end? He wondered as the peace tricked him into momentarily thinking the tornado was gone. It was a surreal moment but after a second he realized it was just the eye of the storm. Things were not over and about to get worse. 

The second half of the tornado was even more powerful thanks to the derbies it had picked up and swirled around. Jim feels the pull of the tornado. He compared it to being a flag in the wind. As he struggled to remain on the bed, the pull of the tornado began to suck up Vicki. Knowing the storm could kill her, Jim grabs onto his wife to keeps her from floating further. The force of his grip left her arm black and blue. How he remained on the bed is a mystery. The intensity of the story was unimaginable but a more powerful force held him to the bed and allowed him to keep the unconscious form of Vicki from being sucked up by the tornado. All the while he is being pelted by pieces of debris. 

 Jim felt as if he had just come to after passing out and realizes the tornado is gone.

Vicki regains consciousnesses to watch Jim stand up, grab his neck, exclaim, and lay down on the concert slab. Vicki notices for the first time the house is gone because she can see sky where there should have been roof. As she struggles to grasp what has happened, she builds up the strength to sit. Blood runs down her face, into her eye. "Jim, I'm bleeding" she says. Jim hears her but does not respond. He can't even turn to look at his wife through the excruciating pain in his neck. 

Water floods the property. The tornado's power had ripped the faucets from their pipes, sucked trees up from the ground, and wrapped the home's chain link fence around a tree. debris were found as far away as 1/4 mile. Their temporary living quarters - the travel trailer - was demolished. Cars and trailers had been thrown, bent, and had windows blown out.

Vicki looks around and notices a man over by her cars taking a look around. Seeing this potential rescue, she pulls together the strength to stand up.  The man comes running over. He later said "I wasn't even going to check this pile of debris until I saw a woman stand up". 

The man is Pecos Hank the storm chaser. He tracks and follows intense storms like the one Vicki and Jim experienced. He had been chasing this twister for miles. He was heading down highway 19, away from Fruitvale, but a tree blocked his way and he was forced to backtrack down 80, passing the Ferguson home. Hank noticed the vehicles in the yard and worried they had been thrown from the highway and, uncharacteristically, he stopped to help any would-be survivors. 

"Life is about divine appointments"

-Vicki Ferguson

Hank runs over, grabs a fold up chair, and helps Vicki into it. He then checks on the injured Jim.

Emergency vehicles were already on the scene blocking the highway because of the downed power lines but like Hank, they did not think to check the pile of rubble that was the Ferguson's home. 

Shannen, Chris, and Giovanni are driving on the highway and hear the desperate cries of Hank as he tries to get help for Vicki and Jim. The overwhelming conclusion was that they needed to get the Fergusons to the hospital immediately. With the 3 newcomers there to assist with Vicki and Jim, Hank runs the 125 feet to the highway and yells to the first responders, trying to flag them down as no one else knew about the Furgeson's tragedy. 

Volunteers start heading to the house, everyone ready to help. 

Hank tells Vicki "I need to get you to the hospital! There is another tornado coming". He takes Vicki to Kaufman hospital. 

Vicki had a concussion and 42 stitches. 21 large stitches on the gash on her head and 21 small stitches on her left thumb. 

HEAR MORE ABOUT VICKI'S STORY ON THIS PECOS HANK YOUTUBE VIDEO

Since Jim had a neck injury, they tried to wait for a board to get him to a hospital without further injury but none is available. He walks out of the destroyed house with the help of two young men. They lead Jim to their truck and help him climb in. Due to the debris it was impossible to get down the road. The truck is four-wheel-drive and they cut across the field to Fruitvale High School where a triage  was set up in the gym for tornado victims. No medications but finally a board for Jim to lay on. 

Sherrie, a volunteer, stayed with Jim and helped in any way she could. Moral support, warmth, and a Tylenol. Jim repeatedly asks about Vicki, worried about his wife but they only know as much as he does - she went with Hank to the hospital (he didn't even know which one). 

The storm rages on outside while Jim waits for the ambulance. 

The ambulance arrives but can't go to some of the local hospitals. Tyler was full and Quitman had reports of a tornado inside the hospital. They made the drive too Quinlan, a drive Jim is very familiar with. In excruciating pain but good spirits, he jokes with the rider about knowing exactly where they are from the "feel" of the last turn. 

Jim gets admitted and receives a CT scan but it is only after they identify the problem that they administer pain medication. His brachial plexus was injured, giving him trouble breathing and the CT scan reviled a broken neck.

Unequipped to deal with this trauma, they send him to a larger hospital in Plano. With the weather still storming, flying is out of the question and he has to endure another ambulance ride. 

Jim stays in the ICU in the hospital for 9 days.

It isn't until the 3rd day that Jim and Vicki are reunited. Since their vehicles were all totaled, Vicki has to borrow a friend's car to drive to the hospital to, finally, see her husband. It's while driving to see Jim that Vicki remembers hearing the Lord tell her "it's not about you".

She passes on the message to Jim and they both begin to pray for the doctors and nurses in the hospital. Word of the power f their prayer got around and soon Jim had people coming to his hospital room asking for prayers.

They hospital staff try to help Jim with rehab before the surgery and a nurse is concerned by the fact that he can not stand through the pain in his neck.  His morphine levels were too high and something was clearly wrong but being ignored. She scheduled an X-Ray which reveled Disks 2 and 3 in his neck were slipping. This was a big issue. Jim was in surgery the next day to fuse the disks. After the surgery he was released to a normal hospital room where he remained for the next two weeks followed by 10 days of physical therapy.

It was only after he was recovering that doctors said "initially we weren't sure if you would ever get out of bed".

Seeing the property for the first time was eye opening. Jim notices deep scratches on their homes concrete foundation and knew it took something big and much force to create those scratches but has no idea what it was.

The tornado even threw the flattened frame of the travel-trailer over the foundation of the house to the other side of the property. Perfectly stacking it on their other trailers. "It looked as if someone intentionally stacked them on top of each other" Vicki recalls. 

Jim spoke to the Physical Therapy doctor and asked "do you know why I am here?". He proceeds to calmly explain to the doctor that they were tornado victims who had lost everything. The doctor went home and had to share the story of the only people he had ever met that had lost everything yet they were happy and peaceful. 

People asked Vicki "how was the ride to the hospital with Hank?" She says they were laughing and acting like old friends. Hank tells another story of a women who "he didn't know if she was going to pass out or die yet she was the one keeping me calm".

This is the type of reaction that only comes from a true inner-peace that only God can give you. It was this foundation that prepared the Ferguson for the tragedy and have helped them through the aftermath. 

This story has been featured on World's Wildest weather (Season 2 Episode 1), Hearts of Heroes (Episode 25)