Aftermath
Last night's storm turned out to be a doozie. We headed for the fruit room in the basement after Joel called around 10:45 from the office where he had decided to spend the night and told us we were under a tornado warning. We live in central Reno County. Rotation in the clouds had been observed in SW Reno County and the storm was tracking NE.
While we were in the fruit room we heard hail smacking on the roof two stories overhead, but we never got a look at the size of the hailstones. It's a little hard to see, in the dark, in a windowless basement room. We also heard high winds lashing everything outside, and we heard pouring rain. Seated on chairs with our knees pointed toward the center of the room, some of us read, Shane followed events on his laptop and advised Dorcas by phone about what to do, we worried out loud about Grant, who was not at home, and we passed around the laptop to take a look at the latest developments. Eventually Victor and Hiromi began to doze off, and when we heard that the storm had passed into the Hutchinson vicinity, we went to bed. Hiromi and I took the precaution of sleeping in Joel's basement bedroom. It was close to 1:00 before we were ready to turn in. We had learned by then that Grant was in the basement of a friend's house.
The storm tracked along K61 highway from west of Arlington to Pleasantview, then angled more nearly straight east, passing very near to where Shane's girlfriend Dorcas lives in a trailer with her brother and sister. They had taken cover in the basement of a nearby school.
News is still quite sketchy, since much of the action happened shortly before press time, and the morning paper didn't include extensive information. However, here's what we know, either from reports we got, or our own observation:
1. We had lots of leaf clusters and small branches from the trees on the the ground this morning. A few larger branches that survived last winter's ice storm did not survive this wind storm.
2. We had 2.2 inches of rain.
3. The tornado(es) that passed by very close apparently did not touch down in our area, except very briefly, near Hutchinson.
4. In Stafford County, just west of Reno, at least one home was destroyed, and there were injuries. No further details so far.
5. Greensburg, which was almost entirely destroyed last year by a tornado, once again had tornadoes in the area, including one that destroyed a farm outside of town. However, the town was spared this time. Some people left their FEMA trailers to go to underground shelters also provided by FEMA.
6. Baseball and tennis ball size hail fell in nearby areas.
7. High winds blew out windows in Hutchinson, and uprooted trees in some areas. Eighty to ninety MPH winds were reported.
8. Water covered the roadway on K14 several miles west from where my brother Lowell lives.
Flood warnings were issued for this area.
A very moist air mass is parked over us, with a dry line just to the west of us. I don't understand weather factors as well as I might, but it seems to me that what is happening is that each day, as heating occurs, this moist air mass interacts with the cooler, drier air nearby, and triggers massive turbulence at the intersection. For some reason, the dry line is more nearly stationary than usual, apparently, leaving us with similar weather scenarios from last Thursday through next Tuesday. The most dramatic weather seems to be shifting very gradually eastward, however. On Thursday it was west of us, and today, on Saturday, it will likely be east of us. On Friday it was here.
Yesterday my farmer neighbor Dwight asked me if I thought we'd get rain, as we both looked at the darkening western skies. He said he hoped so. I said I wasn't sure whether or not to hope for it because I really didn't want what I was afraid would come with it.
"Oh, is it going to get stormy?" he asked.
"It sounds likely," I said.
"What? I haven't heard."
"High winds, hail, possibly tornadoes."
Last night I worried about Dwight and his family. They live in a trailer and I didn't know if they had a weather radio or any way of keeping tabs on what was happening. I said a prayer for them and opted not to wake them with an 11:00 phone call. By then the wind was high enough that I figured they were aware of it inside their trailer, and would be vigilant.
I'm wishing for an auditory dangerous weather alarm for those of us who live outside the range of city warning sirens. Even something like the phone call we got last winter from law enforcement, warning us about the approaching ice storm would be welcome. I think some people forget that not everyone in the world is glued to their TV or radio, and I'd be happy if we could depend on emergency preparedness services to give us warnings.
My irises looked very sad this morning. It's a little depressing, but, in the big picture, this is a small thing. Most of the wheat is still standing, our homes are intact, and our families are safe. God heard our prayers last night and answered by preserving us and our possessions. If He had answered differently, He would still have heard us, and walked with us through whatever we faced. Nature's fury cannot separate us from the good hand of God.
While we were in the fruit room we heard hail smacking on the roof two stories overhead, but we never got a look at the size of the hailstones. It's a little hard to see, in the dark, in a windowless basement room. We also heard high winds lashing everything outside, and we heard pouring rain. Seated on chairs with our knees pointed toward the center of the room, some of us read, Shane followed events on his laptop and advised Dorcas by phone about what to do, we worried out loud about Grant, who was not at home, and we passed around the laptop to take a look at the latest developments. Eventually Victor and Hiromi began to doze off, and when we heard that the storm had passed into the Hutchinson vicinity, we went to bed. Hiromi and I took the precaution of sleeping in Joel's basement bedroom. It was close to 1:00 before we were ready to turn in. We had learned by then that Grant was in the basement of a friend's house.
The storm tracked along K61 highway from west of Arlington to Pleasantview, then angled more nearly straight east, passing very near to where Shane's girlfriend Dorcas lives in a trailer with her brother and sister. They had taken cover in the basement of a nearby school.
News is still quite sketchy, since much of the action happened shortly before press time, and the morning paper didn't include extensive information. However, here's what we know, either from reports we got, or our own observation:
1. We had lots of leaf clusters and small branches from the trees on the the ground this morning. A few larger branches that survived last winter's ice storm did not survive this wind storm.
2. We had 2.2 inches of rain.
3. The tornado(es) that passed by very close apparently did not touch down in our area, except very briefly, near Hutchinson.
4. In Stafford County, just west of Reno, at least one home was destroyed, and there were injuries. No further details so far.
5. Greensburg, which was almost entirely destroyed last year by a tornado, once again had tornadoes in the area, including one that destroyed a farm outside of town. However, the town was spared this time. Some people left their FEMA trailers to go to underground shelters also provided by FEMA.
6. Baseball and tennis ball size hail fell in nearby areas.
7. High winds blew out windows in Hutchinson, and uprooted trees in some areas. Eighty to ninety MPH winds were reported.
8. Water covered the roadway on K14 several miles west from where my brother Lowell lives.
Flood warnings were issued for this area.
A very moist air mass is parked over us, with a dry line just to the west of us. I don't understand weather factors as well as I might, but it seems to me that what is happening is that each day, as heating occurs, this moist air mass interacts with the cooler, drier air nearby, and triggers massive turbulence at the intersection. For some reason, the dry line is more nearly stationary than usual, apparently, leaving us with similar weather scenarios from last Thursday through next Tuesday. The most dramatic weather seems to be shifting very gradually eastward, however. On Thursday it was west of us, and today, on Saturday, it will likely be east of us. On Friday it was here.
Yesterday my farmer neighbor Dwight asked me if I thought we'd get rain, as we both looked at the darkening western skies. He said he hoped so. I said I wasn't sure whether or not to hope for it because I really didn't want what I was afraid would come with it.
"Oh, is it going to get stormy?" he asked.
"It sounds likely," I said.
"What? I haven't heard."
"High winds, hail, possibly tornadoes."
Last night I worried about Dwight and his family. They live in a trailer and I didn't know if they had a weather radio or any way of keeping tabs on what was happening. I said a prayer for them and opted not to wake them with an 11:00 phone call. By then the wind was high enough that I figured they were aware of it inside their trailer, and would be vigilant.
I'm wishing for an auditory dangerous weather alarm for those of us who live outside the range of city warning sirens. Even something like the phone call we got last winter from law enforcement, warning us about the approaching ice storm would be welcome. I think some people forget that not everyone in the world is glued to their TV or radio, and I'd be happy if we could depend on emergency preparedness services to give us warnings.
My irises looked very sad this morning. It's a little depressing, but, in the big picture, this is a small thing. Most of the wheat is still standing, our homes are intact, and our families are safe. God heard our prayers last night and answered by preserving us and our possessions. If He had answered differently, He would still have heard us, and walked with us through whatever we faced. Nature's fury cannot separate us from the good hand of God.
posted by Mrs. I at
12:00 PM
2 Comments:
So glad you're safe. I read about the KS/OK storms on msn.com today.
(Surely pointing your knees toward the center of the room does not increase the safety factor. . .?? or does it. . .??)
By
Dorcas, at 5/24/2008
No safety advantage that I know of. The room was so crowded that when we all found a place to set up a chair, our knees didn't have much wiggle room.
By
Mrs. I, at 5/25/2008
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