Most folks had cows 20 or 30 miles away from their home place and that wouldn’t be unusual at all in early October,” said Gary Cammack. “They’d predicted 4 to 6 inches of snow, which you can handle. On that Thursday afternoon, the Cammacks were moving cattle. After years of drought, rains had fallen in 2013 and the grass was still green cows and calves were getting fat. The Basels’ cattle were about two miles away, still on summer pasture. Rain was forecast, so they locked the sheep in the corral. He and his wife, Tammy, watched weather reports on television when he came indoors for supper. The Reinholds raise and sell quarterhorses, and they also saddle them every summer for 400 youngsters who attend Rainbow Bible Ranch, a camp started by Larry’s parents in 1979.įurther north in Meade County, Dallas Basel was hauling hay from the fields to the yard on that fateful Thursday. Many of their mares and colts were sheltered behind a barn in another windbreak. Before sunset that Thursday, they brought their cows and calves to a windbreak below a big dam near their house and barns. Reinhold and his family ranch 20 miles north of Rapid City. Larry Reinhold called his family together for a prayer as they began the task of recovering from the blizzard. Maybe it sensed that bigger trouble was looming. Quickly jumping off the tractor to check the planter, he nearly landed on a big prairie rattler, but the snake didn’t seem to care. LARRY REINHOLD watched the darkening clouds while hurrying to plant a field of wheat on Thursday, Oct. Molly Reinhold looks for survivors in the snow, following the heart-wrenching blizzard that befell West River. Here are stories from the men and women we found struggling to recover. We toured the storm-ravaged West River Country just weeks after the blizzard. Ranchers lost cattle, horses and sheep in the tens of thousands. When the clouds cleared 2 to 4 feet of snow blanketed the Black Hills and surrounding prairie. It began as rain, but then temperatures plummeted and winds began to howl. Winter Storm Atlas was unexpected and deadly. 4-5, 2013, western South Dakota was pummeled by one of the worst blizzards in the state’s history.
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