NADOES!!!!!!

[squonk 47,840]

Many times I have posted in here that in the 38 years I have lived in my house the power has hardly ever gone out. and when it does it usually less than an hour. That all changed Wednesday night. We had severe storms forecast. The weather pattern here is usually a storm will go north or south and sometimes even split and we get nothing. 

 

My wife was working. She was due to get out of work at 8:30. They decided with the lightning flashing like the flashbulbs at a Super bowl kickoff it was best to close early. At 8:20 I put the dog out quick and the rain started coming. I saw her pull into the driveway and got the dog in. Opened the door for her as she got in the rain came. Just a hard rain then at 8:40 the wind picked up. I watched my weather station wind speed and it was a constant 20MPH + with a 38 MPH gust. Then the power went out so that died. I watched out my bay window and I could see the rain whirling around with each lightning flash. A big pine tree's branches were banging on the house. By 9:30 is was over except for some more lightning. I looked out and saw neighbors with flashlights looking around. So I went out and found oor doggie flag on the ground. Pole holder snapped off. A couple of tomato plants knocked over and a medium sized branch on the ground. I figured no big deal.

 

Morning came and still no power. Went outside and saw the debris everywhere. We got lucky. Neighbors not so much. I saw a street sign that was about 20 feet from my house blown down from NW to SE. My tomato plants blown down from SW to NE. The flag w to E. Neighbors flag pole from n to S.

 

I drove to the north side of the village and it's nuts. They took the brunt. Turns out there were 5 Tornadoes in NY Wed. The one that hit me was an EF1. Another  formed about 7 miles west of me that traveled about 7 miles SE was an EF 2. I saw a pic somewhere of a large camper flipped onto it's roof. I think we were on the south edge of the EFI but the EF2 was just a few miles south

 

Kept getting updates on when power would be back. It was getting later and later. I decided to go to Horror Fright and see if they had any genny's left. They did so I bought the bullet and got a 2000 inverter model. I figured if I bought it power would be on when I got home. Well it wasn't so I set it up. Used a Bill's Mafia table to keep the rain off of it and ran our fridge, tankless water heater and charged the wife's phone all at the same time. Really needed that shower!!! 

 

@rjg854 add your pics! 

 

I may never need it again but NY is beginning to become another Nado Alley. I figure if having a Genny keeps the power out cooties away it's worth it. 

 

Pics of the hood and surrounding area

 

  

  

 

 

 

    

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We're right in the little yellow circle.

 

 

This is a pic from a weather guy south of me. He screen shotted this off of a video he took. I think this is the EF 2

 

Edited 22 hours ago by squonk

[Ed Kennell 46,870]

Glad you dodged the bullet.

[pfrederi 21,010]

Tornado alley is moving East and more north than the classic Oklahoma Kansas corridor.

[ri702bill 12,760]

Glad you guys are OK... Here in RI it's Hurricanes,  - we have had Waterspouts in the Bay though. For NY and west, it's "Auntie Em, Auntie Em watch."

[squonk 47,840]

13 minutes ago, ri702bill said:

Glad you guys are OK... Here in RI it's Hurricanes,  - we have had Waterspouts in the Bay though. For NY and west, it's "Auntie Em, Auntie Em watch."

One of the 5 that hit started out as a waterspout off of Lake Ontario near Lockport

[Handy Don 17,261]

Weather is powerful, for sure. Also remarkable is how sharp an edge a tornado has it moves--here a flattened house and next door a few leaves and branches off a tree. 

[oldlineman 1,793]

We were out about 4 hours, almost set up a gen. but power Co gave me a 11 3 0 am repair time and they came through at 11 20. Pray for our power lineman and personal, they have a very hard and dangerous job, especially after dark. I have worked in there shoes many dark and stormy knights and days and it is a very tough job, but for me very rewarding when we energized a section and the cheers where heard, made it worth while. Bob  

[Dave D. 40]

Man, What a mess. Glad you're OK! I remember in the 80's when the tornados rolled through NC we were out of power for 9 days. My brother lost power for 30 days after Hurricane Helene in the NC mountains, but they were OK. Hate those storms and the clean-up. 

Hope you and your neighbors can back to normal soon.

 

Dave

[stevasaurus 23,795]

Glad you are OK Mike.  No doubt it is getting more dangerous out there any more.  Our usual tornado alley has shifted a little north toward me lately also.  We've had Robo calls and sirens a bunch this summer...and a record of tornados in Illinois this year.  Stay safe my friends.  

[rjg854 13,293]

I faired fairly well, no damage to any of the buildings. Did have a large branch on the roof of the barn, got that down this morning.

Other than that had 2 Ash trees come down, one fell on my neighbor's property it was a property line tree.

The other tree was in the back yard and I've been cutting that up and burning the small stuff.  Just have the main trunk left, and that's about 40 feet long.

Power went out about 8:30 Wednesday night, but I have a generator wired into my main panel, got power back 5:30 pm but went out again until 8:30.  A pole went down when a huge pine tree fell across Rt 89 blocking the main highway and a walnut tree took out the lines that feed the neighbors and my house. Been so busy didn't get pictures of that. Like @squonk said the lightening was awesome non stop all across the sky, never seen anything like it. Picked up 3 1/2 inches of rain. That EF2 passed 2 miles south of me. As far as I know, thank God, no one was hurt. And hats off to NYSEG, the firemen, DOT, and all those that cleared roads and got the power back on. Seneca County was under a no unnecessary travel restriction and even after that was lifted some roads were still blocked.

[Horsin'round 477]

The power of mother nature never ceases to amaze me.  Glad you are safe!

[squonk 47,840]

@rjg854 I went to find where the EF2 went. Finally saw a bucket truck and followed. Mostly on Leader Rd. North of 414 . Saw some metal in a field but no building! finally about a half mile later I found the barn!  Saw one house with the front yard full of tree limbs. Then a cornfield near Yost Rd, where the center was flattened like a steam roller went thru. 

[953 nut 68,354]

Glad you guys are doing well, now for the clean up.

In 2004 while living in Florida we had a Hurricane with imbedded tornados come through. There was a twelve foot space between the house and my workshop so I parked my truck there for protection. A twister came through and stripped all the leaves from a large banyan tree in the back yard, nearly all of them were deposited into the bed of the truck.               Mother nature cleaned up that portion of the debris for me. Unfortunately one neighbor's pool enclosure ended up in my back yard and the majority of the other neighbor's shingles were in my front yard. Neither of their home owners insurance companies would cover cleaning up my yard and since the debris wasn't from my house mine wouldn't pay for removal.

The trusty 1055 with landscape rake took care of the shingles and a metal scrapper hauled off the pool enclosure.

 

[Wayne0 1,616]

Glad you didn't get hit worse!

Dad and Mom gave us a 5KW gennie 20 years ago for X-mass. They are both long passed now, but it was the best gift we ever got. Being on a well, it saved our butts many times.

Hot water and stove is on propane.

[squonk 47,840]

I really debated on getting a genny. Haven't really needed one in 38 years. I went to get ice and was going back and forth about it. When I got the last of the ice the store had I said to my self, ok I'm going to try to get one figuring they were all gone. So after putting oil in it I realize I have no gas!!!  I have 3 cans and when 2 get empty I go fill them.  I have no idea how this happened so I went and filled 3 cans back at the place I got the ice. I'm filling the cans and I hear my phone go off in the car. I'm thinking my wife is texting me that the power was on.  but no it was just hurricane activity on my weather app. 

 

I filled that genny to the top. It ran 4 hours. When I went to drain out the gas the fuel level was still in the filler neck! 

[squonk 47,840]

According to the NWS official report from the Binghamton office, my house was approximately 1mile from the center track of the EF1 and approximately 4 miles from the EF2. Both tornadoes formed within a couple minutes apart

Edited 2 hours ago by squonk

[Racinbob 13,090]

This has certainly been a bad year for tornados across the country. Two separate EF2's missed our house by about a half mile, one north and one south. We watched one on the phone come straight at us and were pretty much waiting for the impact when it shifted just to the north about a half mile west of us. The houses on both sides of us were hit. Fortunately Starke County is extremely rural and both spent most of the time in the woods and farm fields. Other areas weren't so lucky. NIPSCO had it's largest power outage in their history with something over a quarter million homes out. It took them over 2 weeks to get to the 90% restored point. The complaints ran wild but people just don't understand what it takes. I know the linemen from NIPSCO, I&M, REMC and others did a tremendous job getting things back up. While not as widespread, it reminded me of the 2004 Florida hurricanes with 3 in a row impacted us. 

[oldlineman 1,793]

[WHX?? 57,690]

12 hours ago, squonk said:

getting a genny

Didn't you have one on a horse? 

[Dave D. 40]

Power at the cabin goes out a lot. Electrician said he had a Generac with 15hrs. on it. 22KW.

Got a great deal. It works great! Guy comes by once a year and services it.

Priced it here at home and found out what a great deal we got.

You can put in a transfer switch and plug for plugging in a portable generator a lot cheaper., 

It comes on automatically and runs 15 mins. every Wednesday to keep it charged.

 

Dave

 

[squonk 47,840]

48 minutes ago, WHX?? said:

Didn't you have one on a horse? 

I did but  never needed it except for a conversation piece at shows. Sold it to Lane. I probably needed a modern inverter style genny anyways with the electronics involved with the fridge, furnace and tankless heater I have. If I had an old Norge reefer the WH genny would have been fine. And this one uses less fuel than a Big Block Kohler!