Weather nerd goodness
I have a love/hate relationship with severe weather.
Love = there's just something awe-inspiring about big storms...tornadoes...high winds...fascinating reminder to me of how powerful nature is...how awesome God is...all that. I'd love to see a tornado from a distance one day. Just to see one... Over the years, my big childhood fear of storms has turned to fascination.
Hate = storms do bad things...to people/property. I never want that to happen. To anyone. To me. I never want to see a tornado up close. Though they fascinate me, storms still are frightening things. Apparently, one did a lot of damage to my yard growing up (blowing trees down, blowing my small kiddie pool away). I don't remember it, but my parents tell me I was pretty scared of storms after that. Guess that's where this anxiety comes from.
Oh, well...
...
Today is one of those days to watch. The Storm Prediction Center - the guys who understand how all the ingredients come together to create foul weather - has placed all of north Alabama under a "high risk" for severe weather, meaning there's a good chance of numerous tornadoes and even some powerful/violent ones that stay on the ground a long time.
Many of my friends are like, "So what? Welcome to Alabama." Then I get kinda shrugged off as if I was a Yankee wondering what kind of tree grits grow on.
Heh. The reality is I've lived in Alabama now since 1995. I've seen some wicked storms. I've had massive trees blown down in my own yard in Birmingham. I've seen rotating wall clouds 3 times. I've seen a funnel cloud once. I've seen hail as big as softballs start falling with zero warning (no rain, no lightning, no wind, just massive hail). A tornado knocked a tree down onto a friends' car just moments after he vacated it. I've seen a lightning storm so intense that it reminded me of camera flashes at a football game (and even then there was no rain, no wind...just lightning). Lightning struck 3 separate trees on the church property where me and the rest of the staff were huddled in the church lobby staring out the window in awe. Lightning set fire to the apartments 200 yards from my home.
And I'm not a storm chaser. This is stuff I've seen looking out my own back window or out the window from my desk at work - in Alabama. So...weather nerd or not...I've learned to take this stuff pretty seriously.
...
The scariest night, though, was April 8, 1998. Weather sirens started sounding just as we were letting youth go home after a Wednesday program at church. Rumors were flying everywhere that a HUGE storm had already wreaked havoc in North B'ham somewhere. All night long, it was one storm after another. A tornado was spotted spinning over the Summit (just a mile from our apartment). Damage reports everywhere.
Turns out a massive F5 had touched down in northwest suburbs of the city (Pleasant Grove). Storm was powerful enough to turn cinder block into powder and literally dig up the ground 1-3 feet deep like some massive bulldozer. Forests were leveled. 33 (?) people lost their lives.
That day was also a day posted as "high risk" by the SPC going into it. I hope they're wrong this time around. Before those storms struck, everything about the air...the sky...just felt 'wrong.' Air was real hot and thick...not good for April. As the day progressed, everything got really hazy and the clouds in the sky took on this sickish green/brown tone. "Instability," a word used by meteorologists every time this happens, suddenly seemed in our face.
I haven't been through a day like that in a while...where the NOAA weather radio sounds every 5 minutes...and storms are much more than the radar-indicated false alarms that happen so often. Now that I've got 2 kids, my fascination with storms has reverted a bit back to fear. I don't want anything to happen to them.
Guess all we can do is wait and see...
Whee!!
Love = there's just something awe-inspiring about big storms...tornadoes...high winds...fascinating reminder to me of how powerful nature is...how awesome God is...all that. I'd love to see a tornado from a distance one day. Just to see one... Over the years, my big childhood fear of storms has turned to fascination.
Hate = storms do bad things...to people/property. I never want that to happen. To anyone. To me. I never want to see a tornado up close. Though they fascinate me, storms still are frightening things. Apparently, one did a lot of damage to my yard growing up (blowing trees down, blowing my small kiddie pool away). I don't remember it, but my parents tell me I was pretty scared of storms after that. Guess that's where this anxiety comes from.
Oh, well...
...
Today is one of those days to watch. The Storm Prediction Center - the guys who understand how all the ingredients come together to create foul weather - has placed all of north Alabama under a "high risk" for severe weather, meaning there's a good chance of numerous tornadoes and even some powerful/violent ones that stay on the ground a long time.
Many of my friends are like, "So what? Welcome to Alabama." Then I get kinda shrugged off as if I was a Yankee wondering what kind of tree grits grow on.
Heh. The reality is I've lived in Alabama now since 1995. I've seen some wicked storms. I've had massive trees blown down in my own yard in Birmingham. I've seen rotating wall clouds 3 times. I've seen a funnel cloud once. I've seen hail as big as softballs start falling with zero warning (no rain, no lightning, no wind, just massive hail). A tornado knocked a tree down onto a friends' car just moments after he vacated it. I've seen a lightning storm so intense that it reminded me of camera flashes at a football game (and even then there was no rain, no wind...just lightning). Lightning struck 3 separate trees on the church property where me and the rest of the staff were huddled in the church lobby staring out the window in awe. Lightning set fire to the apartments 200 yards from my home.
And I'm not a storm chaser. This is stuff I've seen looking out my own back window or out the window from my desk at work - in Alabama. So...weather nerd or not...I've learned to take this stuff pretty seriously.
...
The scariest night, though, was April 8, 1998. Weather sirens started sounding just as we were letting youth go home after a Wednesday program at church. Rumors were flying everywhere that a HUGE storm had already wreaked havoc in North B'ham somewhere. All night long, it was one storm after another. A tornado was spotted spinning over the Summit (just a mile from our apartment). Damage reports everywhere.
Turns out a massive F5 had touched down in northwest suburbs of the city (Pleasant Grove). Storm was powerful enough to turn cinder block into powder and literally dig up the ground 1-3 feet deep like some massive bulldozer. Forests were leveled. 33 (?) people lost their lives.
That day was also a day posted as "high risk" by the SPC going into it. I hope they're wrong this time around. Before those storms struck, everything about the air...the sky...just felt 'wrong.' Air was real hot and thick...not good for April. As the day progressed, everything got really hazy and the clouds in the sky took on this sickish green/brown tone. "Instability," a word used by meteorologists every time this happens, suddenly seemed in our face.
I haven't been through a day like that in a while...where the NOAA weather radio sounds every 5 minutes...and storms are much more than the radar-indicated false alarms that happen so often. Now that I've got 2 kids, my fascination with storms has reverted a bit back to fear. I don't want anything to happen to them.
Guess all we can do is wait and see...
Whee!!
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