HolyCoast: Thunderstorm Collapses Tent Over Dallas Cowboys Practice Facility
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Saturday, May 02, 2009

Thunderstorm Collapses Tent Over Dallas Cowboys Practice Facility

I was at Macy's waiting for the wife when the raw footage of this collapse started coming into CNN (they had a TV in the waiting area). It could have been pretty ugly:
IRVING, Texas — Dallas Cowboys special teams coach Joe DeCamillis was among at least five people injured Saturday when the roof of the team's practice facility collapsed during a storm.

Cowboys spokesman Rich Dalrymple said four team support staff members were injured and all players and coaches were accounted for. He didn't know the extent of the injuries of the four, who he said were hospitalized.

DeCamillis was seen putting on a neck brace and being taken out of the team's main office building on a stretcher.

The roof came down during a severe thunderstorm while the team was going through the second day of a three-day rookie minicamp. Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, in a TV interview from the Kentucky Derby, said 27 rookies were going through the workout.

Witnesses said lights started flickering and shaking minutes before the collapse, prompting players, coaches, staff members and reporters to vacate the building. Several people were trying to exit the facility as the roof came down.

The storm was producing winds measured at 64 mph just before it struck the Cowboys facility, said National Weather Service meteorologist Joe Harris in Fort Worth.

Dalrymple said rescue personnel were still going through the debris to make sure everyone was accounted for.

The roof is a large air-supported canopy with aluminum frames covering a regulation 100-yard football field.

That part of the country is getting spanked pretty hard today with severe weather.

UPDATE: Here's the video of the collapse that I saw on CNN:

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