Brookville tornado: Neighbors help woman find urn among rubble

Many houses have turned to rubble in Brookville area neighborhoods after the Memorial Day tornadoes, but two men still managed to find an urn holding the remains of a woman’s brother still intact among the damage.

James Isbell and Dustin Copley have spent the week going through neighborhoods to help them clean up the rubble and trees around damaged homes.

“Yesterday we decided we were going to go back out and be able to help people finish it off, whatever needed to be done and we came across Ms. Linda," Isbell said.

Linda was looking through the damage at her home with a relative or friend, when Isbell and Copley noticed her and asked if they could help in any way, he said.

“We walked up and she said, ‘yeah I’m looking for my brother’ and we both looked at each other and froze,” Isbell said.

Linda told them her brother’s remains were in a porcelain urn among the pile of debris that use to be her home. After 15 minutes of searching, they found the urn completely intact with nothing but a red scratch from where a brick was laying on it.

Isbell and Copley say when they heard she was looking for an urn among all the debris they had little hope of finding it without it being shattered to pieces.

“It was all a shock,” Isbell said.

“It was just pure emotion, she began crying,” Copley said. “She said it can only go up from here given the fact we found that.”

The two men plan to continue giving their time to communities in need.

“Now the next big thing is being able to get water for the entire community,” Isbell said.