Cass County family loses horse and 50-year-old trees in high Sunday winds 

CASS COUNTY, Mich.-- Shirley and Elliott Nordgren have lived in their Cass County home for nearly 50 years.

"We have lived here, 50 years in August, and we've never, ever, seen anything like this," Shirley said.

The couple, 88 and 91 years old, was working on a puzzle in their living room Sunday when the severe storm and resulting high winds hit.

"All of a sudden, the wind just came up out of nowhere," Shirley said. "So I got up, looked out the dining room window, and things were flying all over."

The national weather service confirmed that an EF1 tornado touched down near their home Sunday, but it was the 90-mile-per-hour winds caused by the severe storm that upended most of the trees planted by Elliott nearly 50 years ago.

"I don't think we've fully grasped what it means yet," Elliott said.

Shirley and Elliott showed ABC57's Annie Kate all the damage done to their property. Luckily, their house is pretty much intact.

"It only lasted about 10 minutes," Elliott said.

"We were anxious for it to end because we had three horses and wanted to get out to the barn and see if they were alive," Shirley said.

Unfortunately, one of the horses, which belonged to their daughter Jan Quantz, was injured in the storm.

"Mom called and told me that everything was gone. And so I jumped in the truck and saw all this, and then came out to the barn, and realized my horse had been hit by debris," Quantz said.

She said they called him "Blue." He was old and very sick already, so the family made the hard decision to put him down Monday. He's now buried in the backyard of the home.

Meanwhile, Cass County crews work to fix downed power lines, and neighbors work to clear equally bad debris from their yards. Businesses throughout Edwardsburg, as well as traffic lights, were still without power Monday.

Shirley and Elliott were still without power, running water, or heat when they spoke with ABC57. But through it all, they said their biggest lesson is that "God is good."

"It's been a devastating experience," Shirley said, "but we're thankful that we could stay in our house, food inside, and thankful that we're alive."