Amish communities quickly repair tornado damage in Michigan and Indiana

BETHEL, Mich. — No contractors, no repair estimates, no haggling with the insurance company: After a tornado struck an Amish community in Michigan, the work was underway even before the National Weather Service could assess the damage.

Meteorologists make site visits to determine the speed, breadth and impact of a tornado. But sometimes the hammers have already been swinging.

That's what Dustin Norman of the weather service found in Branch County, Michigan, a few days after a tornado Wednesday with peak winds of 100 mph (160 kph). The Amish had put new shingles on a home, reframed a barn and made other major repairs in their community.

He said the situation was similar in an Amish area hit by a tornado that day in Adams County, Indiana, 90 miles (145 kilometers) south.

“Once something gets damaged, they just fix it,” Norman said Tuesday. “We can't always get out there for two or three days. When we do, it looks like nothing happened. ... I completely respect how quickly they get stuff done."

The Amish generally are private and insular and maintain a degree of separation from common society. Approximately 61% of the North American Amish population lives in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Indiana, according to Elizabethtown College.