Elder Swanger arrives home!

Stepping off the plane. 

Poor little airport restaurant got swamped by my family! 

Cousins waiting to see him.

And here he is!

Group Hugs

Elder Swanger with future family missionaries.

Swanger family (missing Alisha's family)

He got home at 3:20-ish today.

Life has been crazy soooo much going on,

I see massive amounts of posts in the near future.

My brother and the tornado

Para-phrased from a letter: I will start off by listing the major damage. The Joplin Stake Center is gone and there are some cool pictures of that, with a picture of Christ left untouched. The St. John's Hospital is, well not gone, but erased and they don't know if there is enough damage that they will just have to rebuild, 75% of the city, FLAT, the feeling as you see it is unbelieveable. The school that thay built several years ago is just gone. Home Depot, Wal-Mart, and Cherry-Berry are flat! I mention Cherry-Berry because we went there last week.

We were up in a suburb called Jasper having dinner with the Talbot family. They informed us on our weather status and we just had a joke filled pleasant dinner. Well, it was storming pretty hard where we were at and we even saw one car that or rather a truck with lights on it speeding to where a hill might be and we guessed it was a storm chaser.

They were very fun to be with. We were communicating by text with our exchange and the Zone Leaders. At 5:23 pm (central) we got a text from the Zone Leaders saying, “Elder& Sisters there is a good potential of tornados today please please be careful tonight if there are tornado warnings or sirens please take shelter!” Exact spelling and spacing. We were just going, “okay we will watch”

About this point the storm was beginning to pick up. At 6:07 pm our exchange, (someone that volunteers to go out and help us teach), texted us and said, “There is a tornado warning!” Meaning they are literally watching one. So that got us a little more on our toes so we checked the radar and it didn’t look that bad. Our dinner was hesitant to take us home but it was a little crowded and the two babies were making a fuss. We were finishing dessert when we got another text from Bro. Brad Fields, our exchange. He texted, “Ya its destroying Joplin!” (Joplin, Missouri). “I would stay inside and seek shelter!” 6:16 pm.

Now we are a little nervous. We were trying to make pleasant over ice cream (cookies and cream) and fresh baked cookie dessert. Bro. Talbot at this point was being kicked off his email by his neighbor and bro-in-law to check out the radar. Everyone else is checking over their shoulders and looking out the window, every other few seconds.

The next text, Zone leaders (dramatic pause) “How is everything…we got hit” (6:21 pm). We tried to call them and text them right after but nothing would go through. There are two sets of missionaries in Joplin. The zone leaders and Joplin 2^nd ward Elders. We are just thinking that the storm is creating interference.

I am so glad that the members care about the missionaries. To the rest of the world it would be weird for someone to be so worried about two really strange men that are in their church for such a short while. Bro. Field’s last text, “Okay just stay safe! God bless! You should check with the Joplin missionaries and see if they are okay!” (6:24 pm)

That is exactly what we did when we got home. Both Joplin Elders and even the Webb City Elders were un-reachable. Because of all this we decided to call the assistants, but they did not answer. So I decided to call President Merkley. I explained the situation and he said that he had also been trying to get a hold of them (the zone leaders). He told me I did the right thing to call him and that I brought him some peace of heart. He then charged us to contact the rest of the zone, and report. (about 7:20 pm).

We finally got a hold of everyone and even ended up working with Bro. Richinns (from the stake) to get all of the missionaries contacted. I called Pres. Merkley about every 30 minutes. I remember every time that I called him he said, “You’re a good man Elder Swanger. Thank you for keeping me updated.” I reported to President at 8:59 pm, right after the last of the missionaries were found safe. This is the order in which they were found. (by ward name) Nevada, Monett, Pittsburg, Granby, Neosho, Miami, Fort Scott, Webb City, Joplin 1^st, and Joplin 2^nd.

My companion seemed worried to a degree but I had an indescribable peace.

And now some cool pictures I (Shaylee) found online of Joplin

Before:

After:

Search and Rescue

Damage:

Dustin had the chance to help out with the clean up of Joplin before he was transferred back to Arkansas, and made a DISTRICT LEADER! He sent home his "Mormon helping hands" shirt and was sent a "Restore Joplin" shirt, both are very neat. 

This sweet couple were the ones who called my parents and let them know that Dustin was okay.

 Elders Swanger and Stoddard (his 1st companion, from the MTC!) 

sporting their Mormon Helping Hands shirts.

Helping with the clean up.

Awesome new name tag with a phonetic spelling of Swanger... genius!

We are so proud of our little brother, and all he has been able to accomplish while out on his mission, it'll be a year in August! And we pray for our missionaries often, Dustin, Aunt Joy and a smattering of cousins who are also out serving missions right now!

The Tornado that hit near Elder Swanger

My Parents had a ward member call them the night (Sunday May 22nd) that the tornado hit Joplin to let us know that Dustin was safe. The next day was Dustin's day to email us. We were not expecting to hear from him because of all the damage that happened in the area. In the late afternoon while Dustin and his companion went to a members home. They called me to again let us know that he was safe and that they (Elder Stoddard too) were going to be on their computer so they could email us. The internet kept going out on them because there were still storms going on, but the following is information we got from Dustin over the course of about an hour and a half.

"We are all good but the damage is really bad. We are going to be there doing service for a long time. We have heard that about 75% of Joplin is gone! We were taking point talking to the other elders to see if they are all right. That was fun all the internet is down and phones are a joke. We are just able to get into the city to help out but we can't go out to help until Wednesday because we are going to mission tour tomorrow. It is bad.

I really don't know where to begin. There is just nothing. There was supposed to be another tornado here but it was in the farms.

They think that it was an F4 or F5 which are really rare. There is much to be done here. But my companion says that the tornado was closer to our house than that but we were other side of town and were really far away.

OH, there was another thing that went on that I should say while we are here and able to type. We found a new investigator that is really sweet and is really asking alot of questions. Matt says that he is embarrassed about the markers (scripture crayons- we sent in a package) but is really grateful. Well we are going to be cleaning and rebuilding things. I don't know when the church is going to be up there (rebuilt) but there are supplies on the way. I don't know what we are going to be doing and all, but we are going to be working hard.  I will have to send you a letter about the new investigator. His name is Francisco from El Salvador.

People here are going crazy here trying to get all the stuff that they need just in case we get another storm. Everyone is jumpy because we have other storms that are going to come through. We have had three just today and we are going to see lots this week they say.

Right now we are getting thunder that is shakin the house every once in a while and lots of rain but the saying is that the Indians even knew that the tornados. There hasn't been one here for a long time, about a hundred years. Just around us and there was not one here, just the one that was coming from Joplin but it went back up to the sky."

Dustin did say that he wanted to see tornadoes, guess he got his wish. We're glad he is okay. I had heard about the tornado but I didn't realize it was so close to him (He was transferred recently) until Mom and Dad called us to tell us. They are currently in Idaho visiting Alisha, Marc, Tori and snuggling Sera Jean.

Interesting Fact: Dustin's current companion is the same companion he had in the MTC.