At least a dozen people were forced to wait out a deadly ammonia cloud at the Country Kitchen restaurant and Behm's Truck Stop, just west of Minot, after the Jan. 18 train derailment. Photo by Colburn Hvidston III / Forum Photo Chief

MINOT, N.D. -- More than seven months ago, Judy Behm said goodbye to her family and friends.

But no one heard the words, spoken softly while she hid beneath the bed covers and waited to die early Jan. 18.

"I remember thinking I would never see Roger or my kids again, or my mom or sister," said Behm, recalling the morning a deadly derailment woke Minot. "I said goodbye to each of them.''

Behm, a 55-year-old auto parts saleswoman at Sears, lives in a brown mobile home tucked in the woods between Behm's Truck Stop and the south bed of the Souris River.

About a half mile north of the Behm home, a Canadian Pacific train loaded with hazardous materials derailed at 1:34 that Friday morning. Thirty-one cars, including 15 carrying anhydrous ammonia, jumped from the tracks.

The chemical, primarily used as a farm fertilizer, poured from 10 tanker cars and formed a vapor cloud over Minot and the surrounding river valley.

Behm's two schnauzers, Kay Dee and Misty, barked frantically to rouse her from her sleep. She rose in the dark to use the telephone but found the power and and phone service out. Her thoughts soon turned to the worst.

"It wasn't too long after that you could smell this horrible smell," she said.

"The stronger it got, I thought it might have affected the whole town and maybe there was nobody to call."

Soon, Behm panicked as her eyes began to sting. "It was getting colder in the house, and it was getting harder to breathe," she said.

Behm shares the home, less than a half mile from Minot's western edge, with her husband, Roger, who teaches and coaches wrestling in Dunseith during the school year. On weekends, he returns home to spend time with Judy.

When she opened the front door, Misty jumped outside. Behm couldn't see farther than 6 inches. The overpowering smell of ammonia knocked her to the floor.

"I thought she (Misty) was gone then," she said. "I knew there was no going out to get her. I knew there was no way of getting out the door unless you wanted to die instantly."

Danger signs

Behm's brother-in-law, Paul Behm, recalled waking Jan. 18 to a phone call from a truck stop employee about 1:50 a.m. Minutes later, he received a second call and learned that a train may have derailed and people at the truck stop smelled ammonia.

Paul Behm's family has owned the truck stop since 1931. Three Behm families, including Judy and Roger, live directly north of the business, which expanded in recent years to include a Country Kitchen restaurant.

As youngsters, Roger, Paul and their siblings swam and fished the Souris River nearly every day. They know the land's lay better than anyone, and Paul knew everyone in the area was in danger.

"I knew them being in a low area, that they should be evacuated," said Paul, who lives about a mile west of the truck stop. "I could see the big cloud hanging there."

Paul knew the dangers of anhydrous ammonia -- he had worked around the chemical before -- and walked outside to wake his neighbors. He returned home for a wet towel when the cloud made breathing difficult.

Now, his focus shifted to those trapped at the truck stop. He climbed into his van and knew he had to find a way there.

Paul sensed he wouldn't make it through the cloud. Instead, he drove an 8-mile loop and approached the truck stop from the east.

Employees and a few customers waited inside the darkened Country Kitchen and truck stop while about a dozen truckers slept in their rigs.

Firefighters arrive

Cory Thompson often stopped at the Country Kitchen late at night after working for his dad, helping run the family's restaurant management business. On Jan. 18, the 25-year-old arrived about midnight to drink coffee with friends.

When some of his friends left about 1:20 a.m., Cory lagged behind to talk to the waitresses.

Dani Reinhardt was working one of her last graveyard shifts at the restaurant that morning. She had big dreams. After living on her own for five years and struggling to finish high school, she was planning to join the Army in nine days.

She wanted a degree so she could teach math to children.

"It was a relaxing part of the night," said Dani, 19. "Then we heard a little boom and felt it a little bit. At first, we thought it was just the lights'' going out.

Moments later, the morning seemed to turn into a movie, she said.

"When I think about it, I think it didn't happen, that it's surreal," Dani said. "It was like watching it on TV. I'm never going to forget it. I'm never going to forget the faces, the people."

Firefighters arrived at Behm's and told everyone to stay there.

"They told us to stay put, everything would be OK, we'll come and get you," Cory said.

Through the restaurant windows, he watched the fire trucks pull away and the anhydrous cloud blanket the area. "I won't forget that as long as I'm alive," he said. "It was just a dense, white fog."

The smell of ammonia filtered into the restaurant through ceiling vents in the kitchen. Cory chose to get a better look at the scene by climbing into his car and driving along a nearby frontage road.

"You smelled that ammonia and it cleaned your clock," he said. "It just stunk."

'Die in my bed'

In her home, Judy Behm attempted to calm herself and covered herself with blankets. The fight to survive, though, overcame her, and she climbed out of bed.

"I figured I had to do something," she said.

With no power, the temperature inside Judy's home dropped and she layered on more clothing: an extra pair of sweatpants, a second sweatshirt and two more pairs of socks. She recalled gagging on the ammonia smell. Overwhelmed by nerves, she vomited.

She heard a helicopter flying overhead, but no one came to her rescue.

"I was trying to rationalize the whole thing," Judy said. "That helped me stay calm in a way. I was just praying somebody was going to come and save me. I think the scariest thing was being alone."

Misty, the schnauzer who had jumped into the cloud the first time Judy opened the door, found her way back to the home. Judy opened the door and let the dog inside.

She feared her husband, Roger, would come home to find her dead. She left the door unlocked, reasoning that if she died, someone entering the house wouldn't have to break it down.

Piling more blankets on her bed, Judy again crawled under the covers with her dogs. "I wanted to die in my own bed," she said.

About 3 a.m., her brother-in-law, Paul, had made his way to the truck stop. Once there, he was unsure if relatives living behind the store had evacuated.

He drove the narrow, winding road to each of the three homes between the truck stop and river. When Paul reached homes where his brother, Bob, and nephew, Todd, lived, no one answered. Both families had left.

Paul drove to Judy's home. He told her about the train derailment and instructed her to breathe through a wet towel.

"It never did dawn on me that it was a train until Paul told me," Judy said. "He was helping so many people and not even thinking about himself."

By about 3 a.m., the cloud appeared to clear and Paul offered to drive her to a friend's home.

Judy thought the worst was over and chose to stay in her home.

"I felt relief when he came the first time," Judy recalled. "I really wish I had gone with him."

A call for help

Those trapped at Behm's Truck Stop and Country Kitchen begged for help.

"We're stuck out at Country Kitchen," one woman told a dispatcher at 2:52 a.m. "We have truckers who cannot breathe and are asleep in this stuff. We need help out here."

"We're aware of that," a man replied. "We do not have the manpower to do that." Listen to the first 911 call 2:52 a.m.

In the restaurant, Cory and Dani felt helpless. They scrambled for a plan to warn the sleeping truckers.

As bad as the air was inside, those trapped at Behm's knew the truckers had it worse in their rigs.

Cory ran to one truck and pounded on the door. The cloud overtook him, burning his eyes and lungs. He stumbled back to the restaurant.

"It was hard to watch him that night," Dani said. "He was in bad condition. It looked like his eyes were bleeding, they were so red."

When the ammonia cloud seeped through the kitchen vents, a handful of people abandoned the restaurant and moved to the truck stop.

Someone called 911 again at 3:25 a.m.

"I'm at Behm's Truck Stop," a woman told a dispatcher. "Is there any way you can get anybody out here because we're getting really bad in here?"

"We have emergency vehicles in the area," the dispatcher replied. "You need to stay inside."

"We can't breathe," the caller said. "Our truckers are out there. We have like 10 truckers around us and they are stuck in their trucks."

"You're just going to have to be patient and stay calm," the dispatcher said. Listen to the second 911 call 3:25 a.m.

But they couldn't wait. The truckers' lives depended on getting them out of the semis because the anhydrous ammonia flowed in through the heater vents.

Dani handed Cory a wet towel. Again, he ran into the cloud to warn truckers parked outside.

"It seemed like hours, but it was only probably 20 minutes," he said. "I don't even know what I was thinking that night. Survival instincts just kick in."

Saving Judy

After Paul left Judy, the cloud grew stronger as shifting winds blew the anhydrous ammonia back toward her home.

Judy worried that she had missed her opportunity to leave. She tried to stay calm by praying and breathing through a wet towel.

"You can't keep track of time that night," she said. "It seemed like a couple of months."

Paul returned to the truck stop but noticed the cloud getting stronger. He found himself driving back down the winding road to Judy's.

The air "was worse the second time I went back there," he said. "The intensity of the cloud was worse."

He demanded his sister-in-law leave, and this time she didn't resist. He climbed into his van to wait while Judy went to the garage so she could drive her own car. Without power, she couldn't force the garage door open.

Judy ran to the van just as Paul was coming to a conclusion: The cloud was getting the best of him, he couldn't take it any more.

"I knew that the level we had was very dangerous because of the damage it can do to you eyes or skin or your lungs,'' he said. "I wasn't fearful until I was waiting for Judy."

Paul drove Judy to a friend's house, where she e-mailed her husband later that morning about the derailment. She told him what had happened and that she was OK.

After teaching his classes, Roger Behm drove the 100 miles from Dunseith to his home. He later found 15 dead whitetail deer along the river banks.

"When I saw these, I knew how lucky I was that my wife was alive," he said.

As children, Paul and his siblings looked up to Roger, a Hall of Fame wrestler at Minot State University invited to tryout for the 1968 U.S. Olympic team. Now, Roger admittedly admires Paul.

"I've always been his hero, but he's my hero," Roger Behm said. "He saved my wife's life."

Leaving Behm's

Those stranded at the truck stop could see emergency vehicles parked on top of a hill about a mile away.

At first, a few people cracked jokes to keep the mood light. Most sat silently in the dark.

Desperate, they called 911 again. This time, they wanted permission to drive out of the cloud themselves.

"Is it OK if we leave Behm's?" the caller asked as her voice gave out.

"No," the dispatcher snapped.

"We can't leave Behm's?" the caller replied.

"Listen to me. You need to stay in your home. Turn off your furnace," the dispatcher said.

"Well, we're at Behm's Truck Stop. There's like 12 of us," the caller said.

The dispatcher shot back before giving instructions: Go inside the bathrooms, block the doors, run water and place wet paper towels over their faces.

"Do not leave," the dispatcher said. "You're not going to be allowed to leave there anyway." Listen to the third 911 call 3:52 a.m.

Cory and another person hopped in a car. They would drive to the truckers. At each truck, the driver honked the horn while Cory jumped out to pound on the semi's doors. Many of the truckers drove away. Some went inside the truck stop.

Less than 10 minutes after the last 911 call, a Ward County sheriff's deputy told dispatchers to contact the truck stop. "Tell those at Behm's to evacuate," the deputy said.

Dispatchers tried to call the truck stop, but no one answered the phone.

"I just couldn't handle it anymore," said Dani, who credited Cory with saving the lives of the truckers that morning. "Cory was a No. 1 person that night. Nobody was going out that night. Cory never hesitated."

Sunday in "Derailed lives'': Seven months later, the emotional and physical pain of the wreck lingers.

Readers can reach Forum reporter

Steven P. Wagner at (701) 241-5542