'I hope they can rebuild' | Demolition happening in parts of Texas hit by last week's tornadoes

CROCKETT, Texas — What’s left of a heavily damaged convenience store is going in the trash one week after a tornado tore through part of Crockett, Texas.

RELATED: 10 injured, dozens of homes destroyed after EF-2 tornado rips through Crockett

“It looks a mess,” neighbor Shonda Harris said. “It’s destroyed.”

Harris was grateful her family’s home at the end of Norman Lane was still standing because family possessions like records, a toy car and a teddy bear litter many properties where other homes were too damaged to salvage after the tornado.

“I really can’t explain it because it happened so, so fast,” Harris said of the storm. “It was just high winds and it just came through and we were all in the tub. That’s the only thing I can say and thank God that it really didn’t touch the house.”

According to a newly updated National Weather Service website, an EF2 tornado struck Crockett.

RELATED: NWS confirms 7 tornadoes touched down as storms ripped through Southeast Texas

It was one of seven last week in the area served by the NWS’s Houston-Galveston office.

Neighbor James Ruple said it took 28 seconds for the twister to nearly take his home as he hid in a closet with his wife and dog.

“I was trying to count it off in my head to how much time I had left on Earth,” Ruple said.

Neither home on either side of his is left as Ruple waded through the insurance claim process.

“This whole neighborhood’s totaled,” Ruple said.

A lot of work is still ahead of them but many said they’re willing to share the load.

“I hope they can rebuild,” Harris said. “I hope they can rebuild and everybody get back to, you know, getting on with life.”