ST. LUCIE COUNTY, Fla. — First responders and medical emergency professionals described the harrowing and chaotic moments after an EF3 tornado ripped through the Spanish Lakes Country Club community in St. Lucie County on Oct. 9, 2024.
The tornado, spawned by Hurricane Milton as it moved toward Florida, injured multiple people and killed six others with its 155 mph winds.
It uprooted trees and sent mobile homes flying.
Just before hitting the community, it slammed the St Lucie County Sheriff's Office hangar where the agency keeps emergency equipment and vehicles.
"It happened so fast we didn't even see it coming. We heard a loud crash. We go outside. I look in that general direction with my staff, and at first we didn't even realize it was gone," Sheriff Keith Pearson told WPTV reporter Kate Hussey. "This is a huge building. This is probably 23,000 square feet, 20 feet tall, just something that you've always seen. It's probably been there for 10 years."
Pearson said, at that point, he had no idea the worst was still yet to come.
“We thought, man, if it did have to hit, it hit us," Pearson said. "Nobody was injured. There's no reports of injuries."
"At what point did things really start to go south?" asked Hussey.
"They went south fast," Pearson replied. "It just happened."
Pearson said soon after he started hearing his deputies call out multiple tornadoes that they were seeing on scanner traffic.
Body camera footage from Deputy Matthew Gerdes showed the law enforcement officer yelling to people outside of the Spanish Lakes community to get out of the path of the tornado.
"At what point did you start hearing about possible fatalities in Spanish Lakes?" asked Hussey.
"About 10 minutes later," replied Pearson, "when you hear the crackling in the voice, when you hear the way in which the communications came out, you knew it was bad. I knew right away it was bad. They said that they needed help. [Deputy Gerdes] said he had multiple people trapped and this was all being relayed over the radio, so not only am I hearing this, but our whole community is hearing this."
Pearson said when he pulled into Spanish Lakes, the roads were completely covered in debris.
“There weren’t any roads. There were people out walking around," Pearson said. "People walking around that were just in shock and you could just tell they were shocked. They didn't know what to do."
Pearson said immediately deputies started digging through rubble to find people trapped.
"We had dogs out there smelling for people to see if there's anything in there. And then getting to it, how do you lift all that debris off that's just mangled steel?" Pearson said. "As gruesome as it sounds, our staff found people in the woodline. They found people underneath the rubble. I mean, these are just houses that are collapsed all the way through."
Simultaneously, HCA Florida Lawnwood Hospital enacted a mass casualty response, with Trauma Dr. David Rubay at the forefront.
"When we activated our mass casualty protocol, we didn't know the total number of casualties we were (going to have to treat), and that was always an area of concern. ... We have all these resources in this hospital, but we don't know how many patients are coming," Rubay said. "We were notified that there was an unlimited number of patients coming to the hospital."
Pearson said his deputies worked to get as many people who needed medical attention to the hospital as quickly as possible.
"We were literally putting them in patrol cars, putting them in fire rescue vehicles," Pearson said.
"The hospital turned to a factory to accommodate all those patients," Rubay said. "When you see the look of fear and concern in the face of everyone on the team, you understand that this is hitting deeper than what you think."
Rubay said 17 people were brought to the hospital, three of whom were in critical condition.
One of those victims passed away.
WPTV has since learned from autopsy reports and family that the patient was 82-year-old Sandra McDonald.
"That was very hard on us, but the other two, we were able to save them, and it was a good success," Rubay said. "I mean, the whole team was affected by this incident. It's nerve-wracking. I can tell you that."
"Unfortunately, we found victims throughout the days to come," Pearson added. "It just hits you every time. It just kind of pauses you for a second. You just hope that there's not anymore, but the reality is there was and we knew there would be more."
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In total, four out of the six victims killed were found on Oct. 9, the day of the tornado. The two others were recovered the next day.
Both Pearson and Rubay said they've never experienced anything like what they went through those days during and after the tornado.
"I call myself, like, an emergency expert, and I was taken by surprise for everything that happened that day," Rubay said. "I hope I don't see it again. It's the nightmare that I see when I go to sleep."
"In 40 years I've never seen any tornadoes even touch down in our community, or even reports of people's houses getting destroyed," Pearson said. "You never see this many storms, this many tornadoes, this much devastation in such a short period — or any period of time.”
Both Pearson and Rubay said there are lessons to be learned from Hurricane Milton and the unprecedented tornadoes that spawned across Florida.
Specifically, in how they can better respond.
"We have had multiple meetings after the hurricane to go through each part of the process. We identified our successes, and we also identified our opportunities for improvement, and we were in communication with the state to address this," Rubay said. "We kind of underestimated the hurricane, that specific hurricane, because the landfall was on the other coast, and we didn't expect that the impact would be significant."
"It really hits you a few days later, like, what could we have done. We always want to reevaluate what we do, what could we have done better, how could we have responded faster, what tools could we have had to prepare for," Pearson said.
For Pearson, he hopes to improve communication between deputies if and when an event like this ever happens again.
"Our radios are down because the towers are down, Cell service is going down because of all the electric going out and the cell towers going down, so communication was a little bit of an issue," Pearson said. "We're constantly critiquing ourselves."
Rubay is working with the state to implement a more coordinated effort to help people in the wake of the tornadoes and believes Oct. 9 will shape the future of Florida's building infrastructure.
"It was an event that shook this whole area, and it helped to educate people about how to prepare and what are the challenges that you could face," Rubay said. "I'm sure that people now think differently about the construction that they will choose, and what are the facilities they have to arrange during such circumstances. ... What type of windows, what type of shutters? All that added more challenges to the injuries."
