Utica Fire Chief Ben Brown was a novice 16-year-old cadet firefighter on the small-town volunteer force when a tornado ripped through the heart of his hometown April 20, 2004.

"The images of the initial chaos that quickly became an organized response once professionals arrived on the scene is what I remember most about that day," explained Brown. "One of the reasons that I became more interested in firefighting, rescues and working in emergency services came from that awful day. I knew then I wanted a career in helping others."

Brown said, "Like a lot of my neighbors, I will never forget that day. It will be with me forever."

A sudden storm, a twist of fate

Fifteen years ago Saturday, the tornado terror in Utica began with the high-pitched whine of emergency weather sirens in neighborhoods right before 6 p.m.

As the sirens blared, 16 men, women and children — some working, some dining, some drinking and some seeking shelter from the storm — were in the village’s popular saloon, the Milestone Restaurant and Lounge. Gathered by saloon owner Larry Ventrice and his wife, Marian, all of the patrons and staff were led to the basement underneath the tavern’s long bar to wait out the storm.

Suddenly, at about 6:05 p.m., a pressurized stillness swept across the surrounding farm fields followed by a strangely foreign roar from the west.

Above the tree line, over Utica’s small downtown district, something huge and metallic was seen spinning high in the sky. It was a grain elevator in flight. Clouds, dust and debris swirled on the horizon.

Seconds later, a category EF-3 tornado hammered the village.

Like giant broken spider webs, power and phone lines crisscrossed the debris-littered streets. Houses, cars, garages and their contents were twisted and thrown into bizarre shapes. Roofs of buildings had been blown off by what the National Weather Service later reported were winds in excess of 200 mph. Shredded pieces of pink and yellow fiberglass insulation dotted yards as far as you could see. Dozens of utility poles were snapped in half.

It was as if Utica’s downtown area was picked up, shaken, stirred and thrown back in loose heaps.

Hardest hit was the Milestone, which was flattened to its foundation.

The fallen

As darkness fell on that night, a very light rain drifted down. With most electrical power crippled, the village went mostly black except for the generator-powered emergency lights shining onto the rescue/recovery effort on the ruins of the Milestone Restaurant and Lounge.

Throughout the stricken community, flashlights and battery-operated radios suddenly became the most important household items a Utica resident needed to find.

The emergency lights over the Milestone site were strategically positioned to illuminate the continuing efforts of the search teams. And, as more and more North Central Illinois fire departments converged on the village, sheer manpower was no longer a problem for the rescuers in their delicate work. Dozens of professional emergency and disaster response teams from more than 30 fire departments came from as far away as Chicago in just a few hours.

The brightly-lit scene reminded many locals of Ground Zero in New York City following the 9/11 terrorist attacks — floodlit ruins encircled by dedicated firefighters and rescue workers digging for missing people buried in rubble. The number of professionals quickly grew into the hundreds. Piece by piece, hour by hour, the tireless workers meticulously dismantled sections of the flattened building out of its own basement during the long night.

Each man and woman working on the site was determined to find more survivors.

However, by daylight the next morning — with the entire Milestone basement foundation clean of rubble from corner to corner — sad news was released from the disaster command center. Eight people out of the 16 who had sought shelter from the storm in the tavern's basement had died, crushed under the ruins.

The victims were:

Larry Ventrice, 49, and Marian Ventrice, 50, owners of the Milestone Restaurant, had just recently finished redecorating an apartment above the saloon. The couple previously lived in Wisconsin, but had family ties in Utica and opened the saloon in 2002. Patrons found the pub owners to be warm, friendly and a welcome addition to the village's business community.

Jay Vezain, 47, a longtime employee at the Utica Grain Elevator Company, was concerned about his sisters in the moments leading up to the Milestone collapse. He used his cellphone to call them from the pub to warn them about the approaching bad weather seconds before his death. He was an avid hunter and fisherman who enjoyed four-wheeling and living in Utica. A lifelong bachelor, Vezain was a good friend with the Ventrices and often ate meals at the western-themed Milestone. He loved to crack jokes with his nieces and nephews.

Beverly Wood, 67, was a widow and a colon cancer survivor known as a helpful friend to neighbors in her Hum Berry Trailer Park home a few blocks away from the Milestone. She was remembered at the time of her death as a fun person who loved to dance. She was having dinner at the doomed saloon with her longtime boyfriend, Wayne Ball; his daughter, Carol Schultheis; and friend, Helen Mahnke, just minutes before the tornado struck. Her family said she was scared of storms and that she and Ball went to the Milestone because they thought it was a safe place to hide from the oncoming bad weather.

Wayne “Danky” Ball, 63, was a former railroad worker who, friends said, grew up in a log cabin without electricity not far from St. Louis Canyon at Starved Rock State Park. He was known as an avid outdoorsman and had been close friends for years with Wood, his neighbor at the trailer park in Utica.

Helen Mahnke, 82, was the oldest of the eight killed in the wake of the Utica tornado. She was a retired registered nurse and had two sons and one daughter. She had apparently hurried to the Milestone before the storm hit, seeking shelter from her home at a nearby trailer park. Friends described her as the “sweetest thing in the world” with a great sense of humor.

Carol Schultheis, 40, died at the Milestone two days before her birthday. She was a cook and bartender at Joy and Ed’s Supper Club on Mill Street in Utica. She was described by friends as a “hard-working, fun person who cared about everybody.”

Michael Miller, 18, was the youngest person to die under the Milestone rubble. Michael’s mother, Debbie, was a cook at the restaurant and was working the dinner shift before the tornado struck. Michael’s father reportedly took five of his children to the tavern that afternoon thinking it would be a safe haven to ride out the storm. Before his death, the young Miller, who was learning to cook under his mother’s guidance, could often be found riding his bike or walking on the Illinois & Michigan Canal towpath.

In the weeks following the tornado, yet another death was attributed to the deadly storm.

On June 2, 2004, two weeks before his expected due date, Sean Kennedy Brown arrived stillborn to Tom and Angela Brown, of Utica. The couple’s doctor believed the post-traumatic stress of the tornado event to Angela, who was Utica's village clerk at the time, was a contributing factor in the baby’s death. The Browns said they chose to publicly recognize the cause of Sean’s death to illustrate the impact of stress on a pregnancy following such a disaster.

History now officially records nine deaths from the Utica tornado.

Reflecting on that tragic day, Mayor David Stewart said Thursday, "A lot of things were taken away from Utica that day, including many lives. The village, our residents and our businesses have bounced back since the storm over the last 15 years and we all have changed a lot. Those of us who experienced that day will never forget what and who we lost."