HILLIARD, Ohio — Sarah Esmail is one of dozens of individuals affected by an unexpected EF-1 tornado that ripped through her neighborhood. 

“It was pretty scary because we kind of got no warning. I mean, it was a beautiful day. That day there was no wind. We went to sleep and then it was like four in the morning that they started sending like alerts and you heard, like sirens,” said Esmail.   

Although her home wasn’t hit the worst, she said she still had quite a bit of damage that they are still recovering from today. 

“Things got blown around. Everything in the backyard got thrown around, siding came down, the roof needed replaced,” said Esmail.  

But she knows it could’ve been much worse. 

“But we were fortunate enough that we got to stay in our house and nothing like extreme, like a lot of the people had. Like the garage is torn off,” said Esmail. 

A woman Spectrum News spoke to last year had one of the hardest hit homes in Hilliard. Her home is now completely gone. But for Esmail and her family, she said it took approximately four months for them to get their major problems fixed. 

“The whole maybe like four months of us getting, like, the roof and the siding replaced. But other things, I’m still kind of like, Wow, that was took a hit,” said Esmail. 

Last year’s tornado came as a shock to Esmail, but now she knows anything can happen. 

“I’ve never seen a tornado before. So when even when I got the alerts, I was like, ‘Oh, really? That’s crazy.’ And then it came out of nowhere,” said Esmail.