Here's a before picture of that location.
That particular area in Phil Campbell has always sent chills down my spine, from a damage perspective; I know that little intersection very well. That's looking down Pinion Drive from Jackson Hwy (237) - basically ground zero, on the right side of the center of the tornado as it barreled just south of the town. I went through that area a few months after the tornado and it's just ridiculously depressing. In that picture, to the right, a dense forest of mostly pines once stood along with three or four frame homes along the highway; the tornado shredded and debarked every single tree in that grove and swept two of the homes completely and cleanly off their foundations (I can only assume there may have been fatalities in them, as there were 26 deaths in the town, about 2% of the entire population of Phil Campbell) - indeed almost every house in a quarter mile of this location was flattened or swept away. On the left, in this picture, atop that hill, once stood a large brick house with a daylight basement; the tornado swept the entire home into what once was dense forests off further to the left, leaving only a few small pieces of debris on the home site and a huge gaping pit where the basement was dug. All that remains now to suggest a house ever existed there is a few bricks along where the basement used to be, and a mailbox near the driveway. All the forests here are bare ground now. That vehicle there remained in the ditch for many months, a testament to the storm's power amidst bare ground and empty foundations. I haven't been there in several months but the last time I was, the residential area south of Phil Campbell was a stark landscape of numerous empty foundations and occasional mobile homes / new home construction. With Google Earth Street View, it's apparent that the now barren area was once fairly heavily forested. From a before and after perspective, I can easily see how even long-time residents would have been completely lost after the tornado, as every landmark in this particular area was gone. Ironically, though, as if a beacon of hope, amidst the shredded forest off to the right in that photo, a single cabin-like home survived the tornado with apparently minimal damage, and as far as I know still stands, with only debarked fragments of tree stumps where the forest that surrounded it once stood. How it survived is beyond me but it's a small symbol of hope for the future and remembrance of the past - how Phil Campbell once was, and what it will be in the future. The healing process may be slow, but it's definitely occurring.
S of Phil Campbell,
June 2006
July 2011