In December of 2021, UKREC was part of a devastating tornado, destroying most of our buildings. In the time since, we have come together to try and salvage and rebuild everything that was lost. Over the past 6 months, I have been working on repurchasing items through insurance, trying to bring our program back to a functional capacity. So far, I have been able to recover over $50,000 dollars back from lost equipment.

We have been managed to pull together our program so that we can have both a field research program and provide Carl with enough opportunity to continue our extension outreach and talks.

Our group has been able to make many connections throughout the University in Western Kentucky. We have office space and workspace at the McCracken County Extension Office. At this office, we can continue our work, both in the office and with research. We also have some space at the Western Kentucky Community and Technical College, where the College of Engineering has allowed us to continue our lab work.

This has been an extremely difficult and trying time, but we are managing to get through it together.