‘She saved our lives’: How a panicked driver spared a family from deadly Florida tornado spawned by Milton

There was no escaping the debris flying in the air, barreling into a tornado forming before Michelle Westfield’s eyes if she drove her car forward. It would be a death sentence.

As the debris flying in the air was being sucked into a tornado forming before Michelle Westfield’s eyes, it became clear there would be no escape if she drove her car forward on a road in St. Lucie County, Florida, last week. It would be a death sentence. She slammed on the brakes, put her car in reverse and bolted backward as far as she could go – the entire time screaming and pounding on the horn on Winter Garden Parkway, a residential road in Lakewood Park last Wednesday. At that moment, a couple heard Westfield’s screams as they were outside taking videos of water pooling on the road. “I hear her scream ‘get in your house!’ and I was like, oh my God, this is bad,” Brandi Clarke told CNN affiliate WPEC. As Hurricane Milton made landfall on the west coast of Florida, the east coast of the state experienced a flurry of tornadoes. Westfield was driving to her home in the Spanish Lakes community when she encountered a tornado that would end up ripping through homes on the road where she had to reverse her car. The tornado in Spanish Lakes killed at least six people. Westfield’s house was left intact, though she lost the carport and shed roof, but she’s just grateful to be alive. After hearing Westfield’s warning, Clarke told WPEC she and her husband quickly ran inside and grabbed their children. As soon as her husband shut the door, their entire house shook with the force of the tornado, she said.