Lexington, Ky.—Sept. 1

Kelly Ferreira was mowing around her Hickory Lane Equestrian in Elburn, Illinois, on the evening of July 14 when she first noticed the lightning. As the flashes moved closer, she decided it was time to make her way back to the house. Ten minutes later, she started getting tornado warning alerts saying to find shelter.

“I was like, what?! All the doors were open in the barn. There were horses turned out for overnight turnout,” she said. “There was no preparation whatsoever, for there wasn’t any warning.”

When it was safe to emerge from the basement, Ferreira headed out to check on the horses. As she walked down the aisle, the electricity still worked, and though debris had blown through the open doors and things knocked down, nothing seemed amiss, and the horses didn’t appear stressed.

Through the rain, Ferreira poked her head out to check on the horses in turnout, and all appeared well. But when she got to the end of the aisle where her indoor arena connected to the structure, she realized things weren’t as unscathed as she’d initially believed.

“I opened the door to the arena and I was like, ‘Why do I see the sky?’ ” she recalled. “You could see the sky and the outline of the trees. And I called [my husband Pete Ferreira] and was like, ‘I think our arena might be gone.’ And he was like, ‘What do you mean?’ I could see the sky when I opened the door, so there’s that and then lightning would kind of light things up and I could see the whole roof caved in.”

With electrical wires down across the property, they brought horses in from turnout and called the fire department and police department. That first evening, some of the walls of the arena were still standing, but when another storm blew through the next night, the remainder of structure collapsed, destroying most of the farm’s jumps. Two massive trees were ripped from the ground and took out large sections of pasture fence.

“Don’t ever put insulation in your roof unless you want a tornado to spread it around your entire property afterward,” she said. “That was probably the hardest part about clean up, was picking up all these little pieces of fiberglass insulation from the pastures. It’s in the trees, so every day I go out and pick up more insulation because more wind blows more insulation out of the trees.”

The barn family showed up to help clean, and the downed trees were repurposed into cross-country fence. Two days later lessons recommenced, some in the outdoor ring, while dressage practice took place in a field. Six days after the initial storm, seven of the farm’s riders headed to Silverwood Farm Summer Horse Trials (Wisconsin), where Marissa Kirchoff and Jackie Corso both won their divisions to secure invitations to the USEA American Eventing Championships.

“I’ve been doing my little kid lessons out in the field with the cross-country jumps, and they are still thinking it’s the coolest thing, ‘Yeah we get to ride in the back!’ ”

Undeterred by their unorthodox preparation, Kirchooff rode Cirmson Luck in the AEC beginner novice junior, finishing ninth, while Corso is riding FGF Smooth Music in the open starter and is 23^rd after cross-country.

While their barn’s indoor has been fully demolished, reconstruction hasn’t started because Kelly wanted to ensure her riders had plenty of opportunities to ride prior to the championships, as much of the equipment will need to be stored in the remaining area throughout the building process. They’ll start rebuilding in a week.