According to weather reports, a total of 30 tornadoes raged through the USA last Friday. In the state of Illinois, an Amazon warehouse was affected. How many employees were working there at the time is uncertain.
The Amazon building is located in Edwardsville, Illinois. When the tornado hit the building on Friday evening, large parts of the roof collapsed, reports the New York Times. Of the people working at that time, 45 were able to save themselves, some with minor injuries. For six people, however, all help came too late. Since it is uncertain how many people were in the building in total, the authorities are currently not ruling out the possibility of recovering more dead during the clean-up work.
Walls couldn’t withstand the storm
A driver described the process to the New York Times. He was just returning from his route to camp when an alarm went off on his cell phone. An employee ran through the halls and yelled at the drivers to get out of the cars and look for shelter. “She risked her own life. She saved my life with it.”
The walls of the building, which are almost twelve meters high and almost 30 centimeters thick, could not withstand the enormous force of the tornado for long. They buckled and eventually brought down the roof. James Whiteford, Edwardsville Fire Chief, said he “doesn’t expect any more survivors to be recovered.”
Bezos is heartbroken
The Illinois governor has already spoken to President Biden and Amazon officials, and has received assurances from both sides that they will help the community.
Jeff Bezos tweeted on Sunday his condolences. “We are heartbroken at the loss of our employees. Our thoughts and prayers are with their families and loved ones.” He also assured Amazon’s support of the Edwardsville community and thanked the first responders who responded to the disaster.
The current Amazon CEO Andy Jassy also announced per Twitter his condolences. “I want our Edwardsville community to feel reassured that we are working closely with local authorities and first responders to support them.”
Released: December 13, 2021
/ Written by Ricarda Eichler