Thunderstorm winds overturned a camper on Sunday afternoon, resulting in the death of a person staying at Cloud 9 Ranch Club in Ozark County, according to a local storm report provided to the National Weather Service office in Springfield.
The NWS issued a strong thunderstorm advisory Sunday afternoon, noting at 2:17 p.m. Sunday, radar tracked a storm at about 10 miles north of Bakersfield and 14 miles west of West Plains, moving east at 20 mph, and bearing wind gusts of about 40 mph. Impacted areas were projected to include South Fork, West Plains, Pottersville and Caulfield.
The fatality report from Cloud 9 was timestamped 2:07 p.m. The campgrounds and ATV/UTV resort facility is located on U.S. 160 in Caulfield, 20 miles southwest of West Plains and 9.5 miles north of Bakersfield.
A post made at about 3:20 p.m. Sunday on the Cloud 9 Ranch Club Facebook page gave further information: Fogey Campground appeared to have been hit hardest by the storm, and a fifth-wheel camper with two people inside of it was blown over and several tree limbs had been downed by the winds.
“There were no storm warnings active when the storm hit, and as of this posting, none were in place,” the social media team posted, noting at the time that one person in the camper was hurt, and the other was not.
A later update posted to the page at about 5:50 p.m. the same day stated that the injured person, a man, had died, attributing internal injuries as the cause. Officials called for respect for the grieving family and said they would not release any names.
The incident is the only local report of any damage associated with rain and thunderstorms that moved through south central Missouri over the weekend. Precipitation amounts recorded in Licking in Texas County showed 3.8 inches of rainfall there and the National Weather Service has a preliminary total of 0.29 inches of rainfall in West Plains since Friday.
