Just as she thought the storm was dying down Friday night, a 30 mph speed limit street sign crashed through Allison Ashbrook's bedroom window.
A tornado threw the sign after touching down in Johnson County and moving 17 miles to Shelby County. The sign traveled more than 100 yards to her apartment complex, Ashbrook, a Ball State University junior, estimated.
"This one really just dropped down from nowhere," she said. "It was really bizarre."
Ashbrook said she had been in many tornadoes, but this one didn't happen the same way.
"There was not a tornado feeling," she said. "The odd color you get before a tornado was not present, the pressure drop you feel before a tornado was not there, the wind dying down right before a tornado was not there. It was just a really strong thunderstorm."
While relatively low in intensity, an F2 on the Fujita scale, which measures tornado intensity, Friday's tornado is an example of the weather that Indiana residents might see during the next six to eight weeks,
David Arnold, professor of geography and director of the meteorology program, said this was the type of weather he had expected since January. Semi-permanent pressure changes around the country are creating circulating air patterns, bringing storms right into the Midwest.
The last time this area had the type of activity Arnold anticipates seeing this season was 1999, he said.
"We've had our outbreaks, but it's been a single event kind of thing, not like these big systems bringing hundreds of tornados," Arnold said.
The tornado that touched down Friday night, only half a mile away from Ashbrook's apartment, was a solitary occurrence. It was unusual because it did not feel like a tornado, she said, but looking at the damage path the next day, it was clear what had happened. Forty homes were destroyed and about 35 were damaged in the storm on Friday, according to the Indiana Department of Homeland Security.
The tornado season in Indiana runs from March to June, but it began early and is more intense already than it is normally, Arnold said.
Arnold recommends students and residents take caution when tornado warnings are announced because a tornado can develop quickly - out of almost nowhere.
"It seems whenever sirens go off on campus everyone runs outside to see the tornado but that can end up killing you," he said. "A lot of people take the attitude that it's not going to happen to you, but I bet those 25 people who died last week in Missouri said the same thing."
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