Rising from the wreckage

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Joplin is rebuilding. Entire blocks are full of brand new houses and newly planted lawns. It’s a boomtown reminiscent of Las Vegas in the 1990s. Train car loads of debris have been removed. The Home Depot is the most crowded store in town. The Walmart, which had been flattened in the tornado, is back in full swing. St. John’s hospital, which suffered heavy damage and was evacuated after the storm, was torn down last month and will be rebuilt nearby. The high school, which had been bursting at the seams before the storm and then damaged by it, is being rebuilt, bigger and better.

Other than a dearth of trees, it might be hard for a visitor to know that the tornado happened at all. Locals can point to leftover signs, though. Some are literally, signs. Teams of visiting firefighters worked with local school children to paint small wooden stars to post on street corners in the affected zones. Scattered among new homes are curb cutouts where driveways used to be lead to empty lots, or concrete slabs from leftover foundations. The former residents or businesses are gone. Often the lots are for sale.

All in all, it’s amazing how much has happened to Joplin in the last 17 months. Restaurants and stores are busy. Cars and trucks, many of them new, cruise the streets.

Still, the Joplin Globe reports that 166 families remain in “temporary” FEMA trailers, nearly 18 months after the disaster. This number is down from the 586 families living in trailers at the peak time. There’s work left to do in Joplin.

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Photos

Star Sign
Firefighters who came to help with the recovery enlisted school children to paint signs of hope

"Hope" High School
Future site of Joplin High School. 4 letters blew off the original school's sign in the storm. Hopeful residents added the H and E.

Driveway to empty lot
All that's left of a former home.