Mikela Kinnison, seven months pregnant, was watching TV with her dog Sunday night when the wind outside her Northside home got louder and an electrical outlet cover popped off the wall.

As the lights flickered, Kinnison heard what sounded like a tree fall, a noise loud enough to make her wonder if the skylight in her kitchen had broken. She walked down a hall to investigate and saw the roof was gone from her master bedroom and office.

“It was raining inside the house,” Kinnison said. “It was insane.”

Kinnison and her husband, Baines Kinnison, had narrowly escaped a major storm that spawned at least four tornadoes in the San Antonio area. It was one of the city’s worst clusters of twisters in recent years and caused extensive damage but no serious injuries, which many people considered miraculous.

“The most important thing is our lives,” said Hazel Carson as she worked to clean up damaged trees at her home at her home on Greenham Street near Montgomery Elementary School on the Northeast Side. “I’ve got a smile on my face because I'm still here. By the grace of God we're still here.”

Updated path of what is believed to be a tornado in north central San Antonio pic.twitter.com/Qc3IHmpqAX — sanantonioFIRE (@saFIREorg) February 20, 2017

The National Weather Service reported a preliminary rating of EF-1 on the Enhanced Fujita scale for two of the tornadoes, one that hit in a neighborhood north of Olmos Basin, along Linda Drive and into the Alamo Quarry Market area, at 10:36 p.m. with winds up to 105 mph, and one that struck minutes later northeast of it near Thousand Oaks and Nacogdoches, with winds of up to 100 mph.

The third one, which traveled from Windcrest to Converse, hitting the Glen and Camelot subdivisions in the area where Carson lives, had a preliminary rating of EF-0 with winds up to 70 mph. A fourth, also an EF-0, popped up in Comal County’s Garden Ridge area about 15 minutes later.

“These kinds of tornadoes form very quickly along squall lines, run a short distance and then they’re gone,” said National Weather Service meteorologist Brett Williams said. “Thankfully, EF-1 is on the lower end and they didn’t last long.”

Kinnison said after her roof blew off, she and her husband tried to salvage what clothes and valuables they could before they fled. Like Carson, they were grateful to be alive.

“If we had gone to bed when we usually go to bed, we probably would not be OK,” Kinnison said. “The beams from the roof came through the roof and would have impaled us and stabbed us.”

When they got outside, they found a tree had fallen in the driveway, blocking their cars and partially crushing one. Mikela Kinnison’s boss picked them up, and the couple plans to stay with her for the next few days as they figure out their next move.

“We only have 10 weeks to figure it out,” Mikela Kinnison said, referring to her due date.

In a news release Monday evening, Mayor Ivy Taylor said she had issued a disaster declaration, calling it "a first step in potentially securing state and federal resources."

"I spent several hours today surveying the damage in different neighborhoods near the Quarry and was amazed to see roofs ripped off homes only to be found mangled in branches several doors down and 50-year old trees uprooted and toppled on tops of cars," she said.

Residents and city crews were still cleaning up debris and working to restore power Monday night. CPS Energy officials said about 3,600 customers still were without power — at the height of the storm, about 84,000 people lost power at least briefly. At one point, two nursing homes in the Northeast Side were on auxiliary power.

“(It’s) all hands on deck,” CPS Energy spokeswoman Nora Castro said, cautioning residents to stay away from downed power lines and damaged equipment.

Two large-scale transmission towers were destroyed in the storm, Castro said, the first time that has happened in the city-owned utility’s history.

City Councilman Roberto Treviño said firefighters and city and utility crews had worked since midnight Sunday to help people affected by the first tornado, clearing tree limbs and dangerous debris and repairing downed power lines on Linda Drive, in Shearer Hills-Ridgeview.

“It was a war zone here,” Treviño said. “Firefighters were cutting down limbs so they could get to people. A lot of people were frightened and didn’t know if they would be able to get out.”

Treviño, who lives near Linda Drive, said he heard an eerie whistling noise late Sunday, shortly before he got a call about the damage.

“It sounded like the air was being sucked out of the house,” he said.

The Chateau Dijon condominiums in the 7700 block of Broadway, near the east end of the path to the Linda/Quarry twister, sustained major roof damage. Fences were ripped out of concrete and some air conditioning units were ripped from the building, resident Susan Yerkes said. But no one was seriously hurt, she said. Some residents are staying with relatives or in hotels.

“It appears that the tornado kind of bounced going northeast from the southwest. There are pockets of devastation,” Yerkes said.

The scene was similar about eight miles east, in the Glen and Camelot subdivisions. Roofs had been stripped off houses and littered the streets along with toppled mailboxes, street signs and twisted metal. Parked cars had shattered windows; some were pinned under fallen trees. There were reports of winds moving parked cars. At least one motorcycle went airborne and still had not been found as of late Monday.

Neighbors milled around outside Monday morning, many pitching in to help those who hadn’t fared as well. Some cried and comforted each another. Many spoke in disbelief. Others echoed Carson, talking about the good fortune of still being alive.

Several doors down from Carson’s home, Frank Chavez, 58, stood in front of his house, checking for damage with his brother. It wasn't as bad as he expected, considering how the winds shook the place. When power went out, he used a candle and the glow of his cell phone to see.

We are out in Oak Park/Northwood meeting with residents and walking the damage. Bring brush & debris to the curb for pick up this week pic.twitter.com/p19wuF9a8D — Mike Gallagher (@d10gallagher) February 20, 2017

Chavez told his brother he had an inkling something bad was coming when his poodle, Claudio, began panting and pacing, then hid under a bed.

“I should have listened to my dog,” he said.

Another neighbor, David Gonzalez, 43, saw a tornado alert on his cell phone Sunday night and rushed his wife and son to a middle bathroom. There was a loud noise, like a freight train rumbling above, then silence.

Storm caused significant damage & we ask for your patience in restoration. Crews are out working as safely/quickly as possible. #cpsenergy pic.twitter.com/GbAxpxo3w3 — CPS Energy (@cpsenergy) February 20, 2017

“It only took about five seconds,” Gonzalez said.

When he looked outside, he saw a neighbor's downed 50-foot tree lying curb to curb, blocking the middle of Greenham Street. It took firefighters and emergency responders from midnight to 5:30 a.m. to cut it up and reopen the street.

That brief encounter with the fury of nature will have a lasting impact on the neighborhood, Gonzalez said. But he told his son not to dwell on it.

“It's a new beginning,” Gonzalez said. “Out with the old, in with the new.”

In the Northwood area near Alamo Heights, Ed McCormick said he was awakened by the tornado warning on his phone about 11 p.m. Sunday.

“I usually ignore those. For some reason I didn’t ignore that one,” he said.

He heard the howl of the twister, then ran to help his wife and son when a beam from his carport flew through the master bedroom.

“That’s what saved me from the beam coming through and skewering me,” McCormick said.

By noon Monday, three volunteer emergency crews had assessed 67 homes in the Glen and Camelot areas as damaged and more were expected, Bexar County spokeswoman Monica Ramos said. In the Linda Drive and Alamo Quarry Market area, more than 45 homes and buildings were damaged. There were no immediate estimates on the amount of damage where the other EF-1 tornado hit near Putting Green Road, just north of Thousand Oaks and Nacogdoches.

H-E-B spokeswoman Dya Campos said the San Antonio-based supermarket chain’s stores at 415 N. New Braunfels Ave. and 999 E. Basse Road lost power Sunday when the storm hit and had to use backup generators and refrigerated trailers to protect frozen and refrigerated food products. H-E-B is still assessing how much inventory was lost as a result, Campos said. The H-E-B on Basse reopened Monday morning, the one on New Braunfels Avenue reopened Monday evening.

San Antonians reached out Monday to help their neighbors. District 10 City Councilman Mike Gallagher offered help at his district office via Twitter: “Please come in to charge your phones, grab coffee and bottled water, etc.”

In the Northwood area, St. Andrew’s United Methodist Church held a spaghetti dinner Monday night and invited storm victims, rescuers and caretakers to eat, rest, recharge their phones and let their kids play in the gym on the church campus.

Staff Writers Brittney Martin, John MacCormack, Joshua Fechter, Edward Ornelas, Rye Druzin and Richard Webner contributed to this report.

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