Pet owner reunited with 3 cats after home hit by Florida tornado

    PORT SALERNO, Florida (WPTV) -- In the aftermath of the tornadoes that hit our community last week, many families are struggling to find pets that scurried away from their homes.

That includes one woman who thought she had lost her three cats. However, Mattie Gordon recently got some good news.

Gordon's home in Port Salerno was among the hundreds damaged by the tornado outbreak and her felines were missing.

Two days after the storm, two neighbors went searching, lifted Gordon's bed and found them hiding underneath.

She is relieved her three kitties are now safe in their temporary home, a local hotel room.

"I was just so worried about them," Gordon said. "[I feared] that they were hurt or whatever, and they didn't have any food."

She said when the tornado hit last Wednesday her cats: Annie, Suzy and Mooch rushed under her bed as she ran for cover.

"I was devastated. I just kept saying, 'My cats, my cats. I have to get my cats,'" Gordon said.

But even after missing for two days, hope wasn't shattered.

"Two neighbors — two girls — came to me, and she said, 'Come on, we're going to get your cats,'" Gordon said. "And they came in, one lifted up the bed, and the other one scrambled underneath."

Her three cats are now safe.

"I have been a widow for 29 years, and cats are almost ... like service animals to me," Gordon said. "They're my everything."