Storm Warnings

Friday at noon:

We're huddled in the laundry room in the the basement, television news on loudly in the next room, waiting for a powerful storm to pass. Heavy rains and strong winds have just hit and the sky is dark. Upstairs the weather radio is sounding its alarm, and the neighborhood tornado sirens are blaring.  Tornados have been seen on the ground thirty minutes to the west of us and a two-story house out that way collapsed.  

What a contrast to our winter wonderland of Christmas day!  The snow melted away earlier in the week, and we've gone from white to brown and muddy.  We've had an unusual warmup, and today, the last day of the year and ten days into winter, the temperature is 61 degrees.  As our next cold front marches this way, things started to get active at 2:30 in the morning when the weather radio alarm first went off announcing a severe thunderstorm watch. It has sounded several times since as new watches and then warnings have been issued.  

1:00 p.m.

The worst of the storm has passed and though there is some debris on the ground, we have managed to escape fairly unscathed.  A couple of boards turned up in the yard from who knows where and some large pieces of cardboard managed to land high up in a couple of large trees next door!  Also a piece of someone's aluminum siding.  Ominous.

4:30 p.m.

I went to work for a couple of hours where I heard that there were some major roads closed near where I live.  On the way home, I drove through a busy section of road with no working traffic lights and I heard on the radio that 20+ properties in the community next to mine suffered some severe damage -- or were demolished!  When I got home I turned on the TV to see images  of cars turned on their sides, and a residential area that is pretty well flattened.  There's damage in my town, but not as severe.  Miraculously, no one in the local area was injured, although there were some deaths further west in Missouri and in Arkansas.

So unusual for December, and a little too close for comfort.  What a finish to one year, and for some local people, a rough start to the new one.