MAYFIELD, Ky. — For Alenia Scott, picking up the pieces after the Dec. 10 tornado hit Mayfield means starting all over. 

What You Need To Know

  • More than 100 people were inside a Mayfield candle factory when it was hit by a tornado on Dec. 10, 2021

  • Alenia Scott, a candle worker, lost her job, car, home, and pets

  • Three bones in her foot were broken during the storm

  • She has been struggling with Post-traumatic stress disorder

 

“I lost my car, I lost my home and I lost my job all in one day. My pets are displaced at the moment because I can't have them where I’m at,” says Scott. 

Scott was at work at Mayfield Consumer Products when the first and second warnings went off. 

“We were all just standing up because we already had just one tornado warning and nothing happened so we're just thinking that this was just gonna pass by too so we were all just standing around and all of a sudden you look up in the metal roof it’s just moving and my boss was just like everybody get down now,” says Scott. 

She took shelter between two water fountains.

“The way I sat because of the weight on the wall it broke three bones in my foot,” says Scott. 

In pain, she limped out of the building grateful she and her son who also worked at the factory, survived.

“I mean, we were just so close … so close. While we're still here, it's a miracle. It truly is,” says Scott. 

Some of her co-workers, one who was sitting right next to her, did not make it out. 

“I was within arm's reach of the security guard, but I didn't know that until they got the debris off of us,” says Scott. 

Smith has a long road to recovery ahead of her physically and emotionally. 

The tornado not only ripped through the candle factory where she was working that night, but it also washed out the duplex where she lived.

Alenia Scott’s mother lived in this side of the duplex. This wiped out space used to be a living area. (Spectrum News 1/Ashley N. Brown)

Smith’s mother was on the other side of the duplex when the storm hit. She survived but did suffer injuries from a dresser that fell on her. 

“PTSD (Post-traumatic stress disorder) is awful. I cry all the time just randomly. I mean, I could be just fine and just start talking about it and it's been hard, really hard,” says Scott. 

She doesn’t know how, when, or where she will rebuild her life. 

“Where are you gonna live in Mayfield anymore? It’s gone,” says Scott. “I just want some kind of normalcy. I really do. Nothing's normal anymore,” says Scott.

In the meantime, she is staying with her daughter until she can figure it out. 

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