Monday, October 25, 2021

Shelter From A Storm

Last night we had some nasty storms come through the area, including multiple tornadoes. Fortunately the worst of it passed to the south of us and the only damage was some twigs on the deck. 

About the time the high gusts of wind and pouring rain passed through our area it was time to turn on the local news. The meteorologists had taken over from the anchors, discussing the weather situation in animated tones. They even had someone who was storm chasing and providing updates. After almost a half hour of those meteorologists rehashing the same data we turned off the television. Tony fed Jackson the cat and we both got ready for bed.

Tony put a local jazz show on the radio. I was drifting off to sleep when I heard the jarring tone of the emergency alert system, announcing a tornado warning two counties to the east of us in Illinois. The system did what it was supposed to do (get my attention), but then I had a hard time settling back in. My mind started racing, and I realized that if the weather had been in our area we had no emergency plan in place.

We live on the second floor of an apartment-style condominium building with a garage tucked underneath. If a storm was rapidly approaching would it be safer to hustle down two flights of stairs into the basement garage or hunker down in an interior room? At night we would have to throw something over our pajamas in case our neighbors were doing the same thing we were, which would take extra time. There would also be the issue of finding Jackson and carrying him down with us.

This morning I sent out a text to some of our neighbors asking them what they did in the event of a storm. They all told me they headed to the garage. One woman said she sat in her car. The others did not share any details. Hopefully I'll never have the opportunity to figure out exactly what they do.

Five years ago today: Froggy In A Flowerpot

24 comments:

  1. Planning is everything. Unfortunately, it depends on factors that we don't always have control over them. With Climate Change, we have to be on the alert all the time.

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  2. Very scary Kathy glad you were spared this time.

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  3. I live in the St Louis area and the weather reporting on tv drives me nuts. For one thing,a severe storm system can be further north than Bowling Green Missouri, or 100 miles away in Southeast Missouri and they report it as "WE are having severe weather this evening." I'm in a suburb of St. Louis not too far from the airport. When I hear "WE" I always first assume that the St.Louis area is affected, now days sometimes it is and sometime it isn't. I am thankful that my area of "WE" wasn't badly affected last evening. I wish they would make one special part of the weather report for the local St. Louis area,and then make a separate part of the weather report for outlying areas north, south, west, and Illinois areas that they cover now. Kristen Cornett does a very smooth, calm, professional job of reporting the weather. I often see her morning reports and they don't leave me with an anxiety attack. I miss the weather persons/meteoroligists that we had in the past. Dave Murray and then Cindy Pressler, I thought both did excellent weather forecasting and presentations. They spoke slow enough that I could catch what they said. They didn't stand in front of the St. Louis area of the map as they spoke, and they didn't refer to rain or snow being a "decent amount". Tell me an actual measurement, guess if you have to, but I want it in inches, or god forbid feet of rain or snow.. One person's decent is another person's indecent. Dave Murray or Cindy Pressler may have said decent a few times throughout the many years they did the weather forecasts, but not very often, and if they did they went on to quantify with an actual numerical amount.

    After each of my knee surgeries, I thought I would be safer to seek shelter on the main floor of our home, in the corner of the hallway,in the middle of our house, rather than trying to get down and up our basement stairs. If I was wearing pajamas, I'd change into regular clothes, put on shoes, put on my old heavy wool coat (to protect from flying debris) and for the piece de resistance, my Dad's keepsake OSHA approved construction worker hardhat. I would sit in a chair in the hall, while my husband and our Pomeranian went downstairs to wait it out. I always wonder if my hardhat might blow off and away, and I thought about wrapping one of those long fashion scarves up and around the top of the hat and tie it under my neck, to keep it on my head. Then I thought that might be bad if the wind gets under my hard hat and pulls it upward with my head tied to it. I still shelter in the hallway when the weather is bad, because my knees are still not too good on steps, and I wonder to myself if I should get a helmet of some kind instead of the hardhat. I say I wonder to myself, because if I said something to my husband about me getting a helmet, he would think I am goofy. He may be right.




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    1. Dave Murray is my all time favorite weatherman. I appreciated his down to earth method of reporting. I had to giggle at the mental image of you sitting in the hall wearing an overcoat and a hard hat.

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  4. Isn't that scary! We've lots of rain for 24 hours or so. Such storms. Take care and I hope you figure it out!

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  5. That was a scary night for you!
    We have lots of rain today.

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  6. Most tornadoes happen at night while we're both sleeping, it seems. If I did go over to the grandson's basement for safety, my husband wouldn't go with me. And we live in a trailer house! Honestly, I don't worry about it until there's a tornado warning really close.

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    1. I bet I'll do the same thing, and the issue will drop off my radar until the next event :-)

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  7. The TV stations report on weather for a huge viewing area... so we check online and when the sirens go off it's down to the basement. And that's where we were Saturday when they went off. The storm was a quick moving one !! No tornadoes...

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  8. I think the weather people get paid by the word.

    We got Go Bags a few years ago. Three days of supplies for around $50 a bag. I can't remember where we bought them but just go to Amazon a search go bag.

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    1. I think maybe you're right about the weather folks and their tendency to talk :-)

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  9. Around Perryville seems to be a storm magnet and dividing line for bad weather. Go figure. For your own storm shelter I would pick a corner away from the door and re-enforce it up somehow. For Jackson, have a heavy duty pillow case ready to stuff his butt in (that's what we plan with Persia until we can get her into the crate in our understairs storm shelter). We also lock her in our bathroom if bed weather is threatening...don't have to hunt her down. BTW, cat litter tub/buckets are perfect for storing up emergency supplies.

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  10. I always vowed I'd never live in tornado alley ... but here we are, 3 years in Alabama. Taking a page from our chief meteorologist, my first purchases were road-certified motorcycle helmets (that) I keep in the interior bathroom cabinets. He said the majority of tornado-related deaths are a result of head injuries. Still scared at times, but prepared as best we can.

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    1. I'd never heard of using a motorcycle helmet for anything other than riding, but it sounds like a sensible idea.

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    2. I found ours, new-in-box, for only $35 on eBay.

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    3. What a fantastic idea about the motorcycle helmets!!! That will be my next eBay purchase!

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  11. It certainly was frightening. We had family living in the affected area, so very concerning for a while. Still cannot post on my blog and I have stuff to share.

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    1. Hope to see a post pop up in my reader soon.

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  12. Oh boy, its scary to be in tornado areas. we don't have them often in Oregon but do now and then. I don't have a plan in place for a tornado. Not even for an earthquake. Sure i have a "go" bag, but if there's an earthquake, and your house is damaged, probaby the "go" bag gets buried too and besides there'd be no place to "go" to.

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    1. I agree that it's a good idea to be prepared, but sometimes Mother Nature gets in the way.

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