Demand for storm shelters surges in Randall County after close tornado encounter

AMARILLO, Texas (KVII) — There are approximately seven different storm shelters that come in 20 different sizes and anything that can go in the ground and be installed the fastest is now in demand.

Friday night’s severe weather outbreak generated tornados (EF1) and (EF0) which made for a very close call for residents of Randall County who live in Canyon.

“I think that everybody should definitely look into getting a storm shelter put in because these are brand new build brick homes, and you can see the damage and everything,” said Nichole Welch, Randall County resident. “We were hiding in the bathroom and stuff like that, it makes you wonder, is that going to be safe enough?”

“Right now, an order is taking three to four weeks you know by the time you order it, and we can install it,” said Darrel Podzemny, owner of EF-5 Shelters.

With the help of home equity and a home improvement loan that gives the potential buyer has options when it comes to the financials of purchasing a storm shelter.

“It’s kind of feast or famine, in the wintertime you don’t sell many shelters, so you kind of have to plan for that,” said Podzemny. “We build a lot of inventory in the wintertime, typically, so yeah, it just depends on supply and demand pretty much.”

“You're good until this happens,” said Welch. “Then you think I wish I had done that. Canyon would have been devastated had it been any worse than this and these houses would have been gone, so you definitely need to have some kind of shelter in place.”

We’re not out of the woods just yet as we have at least two to three months of what could potentially be an active spring with severe weather.