water in the basement

[Steve - K4HX]

We're in the purple!

[Ralph W3GL]

   About 6:10 pm (eastern) this evening, I'm sitting in front of the tube
   watching the news when I thought a truck came off the street out front
   and tried to   enter the house...

   Turns out there was a gust in excess of 50mph came in from the North
   East and took down one of two 60' Pine trees out front and landed directly
   above where I was sitting.  Didn't penetrate the living room ceiling and I'm
   not going out till after I get up tomorrow morning to check and photograph
   the damage.

   With all the rain we have had this month, it will be a wonder if any of the
   trees will  still be vertical by the end of Irene's trip through the area.

   Of course, Travelers will be receiving a phone call first thing Monday morning.

   PS,  It's really blowing out there now...

[W3GMS]

Ralph,

Wow, you a lucky guy that the falling tree situation was not worse.  We are having Tornado warnings all over our county.  It appears a pole peg exploded just down from us.  We lost power for a short time but fortunately power came back. 

They are recommending that in areas of the Tornado warnings that people sleep in there basements.

Joe, W3GMS

       

[WA1GFZ]

Joe, we had tornado warnings west of us at the beach. We headed north just as it was getting interesting. I park under a 30 inch white oak next to the driveway so figured it was time to move on.

[w1vtp]

Ralph

Good talking to you tonight.  GL with that tree thing.  Hope the rain doesn't get in

Al

[WA1GFZ]

Basement bone dry plastic working great

[Todd, KA1KAQ]

Good job, Frank. The little diversion ditch and banking worked here, too. No water in the garage/radio area despite a day plus of rain.

The only saving grace for any tornadoes spun off of the hurricane is that they tend to be very short-lived and not as powerful as the stand-alone monsters seen earlier this year. We had several hit here before and as the storm moved up the coast yesterday damaging a few homes and businesses.

Looks like it is indeed a blustery rain storm for the New England area. Those poor weather channel people are scurrying to find something significant to report, showing boats in harbors 'bobbing furiously' and such. They do that on a breezy day, but it's not news then.

Sunny and 90 predicted for here today. Been out scooping leaves out of the pool so I can restart the pump, moving on to branch and limb removal next. Looks like we'll all get out of it easily compared to what we were threatened with. Glad you got through alright Ralph, despite the tree. It looked like it was going to track right over your location.

Wondering how Steve ended up. Looks like PJP got wet and probably has some power outages around his LI location.

[WA1GFZ]

I bet Joe got hammered based on the beach last night I just north of him across the sound.

[w1vtp]

Lucked out here.  Had one power glitch. The Tektronix 2445 rebooted, the Ameritron step-start cycled. The Flex didn't even know anything happened.  That was it. Lost a few small branches - that was it.  Boy! The Box Elders that line my property were sure dancing a jig.

Sump well didn't even get damp.

Al

[Todd, KA1KAQ]

Heard back from Joe/PJP this morning from mid-Long Island. Some damage at his place to aerials and trees, power and phone are out, but no flooding where he is. He has some damage up at his commercial tower site which sounds relatively minor (bent antenna elements, etc) if you don't count the 200+ foot climb, of course. So it seems he got through it pretty well but will be without power and landline for a while. His generators are providing backup at this time.

[KM1H]

From Saturday 5PM pre Irene rain to 7PM Sunday a grand total of 4.5" of rain and a few 30-40mph gusts late Sunday here in the Salem/Nashua area. I get that on many normal days up on the open hilltop. No power loss except a few quick breaker trips at 7AM on Sunday for some strange reason, maybe a drunk hit a pole.

Its those May and October 1-2 days of solid rain and no winds that are the problem. A few years ago one took out all 5 bridges in town and literally split the town in half making it a royal PITA to get places. And with all the ground soak the trees were falling over the power lines.

It was the heavy rains earlier in the week in VT that enhanced the flooding from Irene which boogied thru at around 30mph.

Carl

[Todd, KA1KAQ]

We only got 2.5 inches or so here from the storm if that, Carl. A very few miles from here it was quite different. The edge of the heavy rainfall was well defined on the radar and vapor images.

Vermont floods. That's the big disaster the state has always suffered from. I was up there twice in spring and early summer. Between trips there were a couple days of heavy rain. It washed out roads, took out bridges, flooded much of downtown Barre and other areas. They had sandbagged part of Rte 14 and pumps running in the town where my folks live when I returned. The problem is, a lot of hills and mountains running the length of the state which are great at collecting and funneling water, and too few rivers capable of removing it fast enough. Toss in a few uprooted trees and a bridge or two, and the state goes underwater.

The big flood of '27 was the one that did a lot of damage. Took out most of the covered bridges and a lot of other structures state wide. That's the one they measure all others by in VT. Of course, the Connecticut river used to be an open river for running logs, but along with others, it was dammed up in different places, which changes things as well.

Glad you got through it without any big problems, Carl. All those old radios are safe and sound up on that hill.

[Steve - K4HX]

Power went out at about 2PM on Saturday. It came back on for a few hours Saturday night. Then it was out until about midnight last night. Saturday evening was the worst of the storm. The winds cranked up to 70-80 MPH. During the storm we had 6-8 inches of rain.

Unbelievably, we did not have any branches larger than about 2-3 feet long and an inch in diameter come down. But there was tons of smaller branches, leaves and clumps of leaves everywhere. The yard is covered. I hauled 8 wheelbarrow loads off the driveway alone. BUT, nothing hit the house. Lots of trees and partials down all over town. I saw one auto parts store that had the front glass area give in and then the roof caved.

We had a small generator for some lights and to keep the refrigerator and freezer cold. Over all, it wasn’t very bad. Of course, if a big tree his our house (like some here in town did), it would have been a different story. Apparently there was lots of flooding down in the Norfolk and VA Beach areas. So the storm was bad, but not as bad is some of the forecasters predicted. As of midnight, there were still 300-400 thousand people without power in the Richmond  and Tidewater areas.

All the antennas remained up. I gave them tons of slack, so as the trees moved around, so did they. I think my water proofing for the connectors on the 40-meter loops may have been compromised. I'll have to see if any water entered the cables or the relay box.

I’ll have some photos this evening.

[WA1GFZ]

I've been trying to snap a #10 wire caught in a tree for 10 years. There are about 20 4 inch spreaders stuck in the air. Last Friday I hung 4 car rims about 2 feet higher off the ground. This weight has been on it for two years. Extra height did nothing still hanging tuff. Also had a rope stuck in a tree and added weight and it is still up there.

[Steve - K4HX]

Tie it to your truck and take off. I've used this approach to get stuff out of trees more than once. I'm sure my wife and neighbors thought I was nuts. They are probably correct!

I've been trying to snap a #10 wire caught in a tree for 10 years. There are about 20 4 inch spreaders stuck in the air. Last Friday I hung 4 car rims about 2 feet higher off the ground. This weight has been on it for two years. Extra height did nothing still hanging tuff. Also had a rope stuck in a tree and added weight and it is still up there.

[WD8BIL]

I'm sure my wife and neighbors thought I was nuts. They are probably correct!

Same here, Steve. Shooting arrows over trees, hanging wires all over the place and using the tractor to free stuck lines......
They all think I'm nuts. PLUS, they know I own guns so it tends to keep them out of my hair!

[WA1GFZ]

I'm leaning that way. If I try it I'll put plywood across the back window just in case.
That friggen hunk of #10 is the strongest copper I have ever seen. I must have 60 pounds hanging off it 60 feet below the limb it is caught in.
My neighbors and XYL know I'm nuts so nobody left to impress sept for the cat.

[Steve - K4HX]

Some storm pix. Nothing too spectacular.

1. The lake exceeded the normal shoreline by about 15 feet. The water almost reached the support pole for the 40 meter loops. The little post in the bottom right (in the water) is the end of one of my Beverages.

2. Some of the debris in the driveway during Saturday afternoon.

3. The debris in the driveway on Sunday, after the storm

[Steve - K4HX]

1. Beginning of clean up

2. Largest branch that fell in my yard (not very large thankfully).

3.  More crud in the back yard.

[Steve - K4HX]

1. The 40-meter delta loops still standing after swinging in the wind for 24 hours.

2. The 160 and 80 meter dipoles still aloft. I may have put too much slack in the 160 dipole! It was nearly banging into the chimney.

3. My neighbor's beam on his crank-up tower. It looks like the boom may have rotated a little.

[Steve - K4HX]

Some shots of damage in the neighborhood and nearby.

[Steve - K4HX]

1,2. A few more local shots.

3. Two storm survivors.

[Todd, KA1KAQ]

Looks like you guys got the same stuff that was 5-6 miles east of us, with highway signs torn down and trees across the roads. I was sure we'd get more damage here, being so much in the open, but thankfully we did not. Aren't those soggy leaf clumps fun to gather up? I just burned the big brush pile here the day before the storm, now there's another one in its place.

3. Two storm survivors.

So where's #3, aka Bigfoot? 6 more months, he'll be the size of Sasha! Did you see any odd behavior from them due to the storm? We had one cat sleeping through most of it (the Iowa Class cat) and the other running back and forth through the house like his fur was on fire. They didn't seem to flip out over the 'quake, either.

[Steve - K4HX]

I wish I could burn here.

The animals seemed pretty calm. They were getting more attention than usual, so they liked the storm.  


Still over 200,000 people without power in VA. About 120k in the greater Richmond area and 70k in the Southeastern VA area (VA Beach, Norfolk, Hampton, etc). Some houses just a few miles from here are still out. We're pretty lucky.

http://www.dom.com/storm-center/dominion-electric-outage-map.jsp

[Todd, KA1KAQ]

It'll be a few days before it all gets sorted out. Here too though, like you, we dodged the worst of it. It was a good idea to burn the brush Friday, as the winds were favorable to not only deal with the pile fast, but to take the smoke away from the houses in the area.

Talked with Ma B again today, she said the sun has been out and the wx has been fine, temps in the 70s. They never lost power, nor phone service, though they did get a lot of rain. And although there are some pretty horrendous photos on the news channels showing some serious damage to roads and bridges, she said the old guy took his Harley for a ride up to the northern part of the state yesterday to see a friend. No issues beyond a few puddles.

She also said that she's making up some PIES in advance, and freezing them. So if or when we wander up there, all she has to do is fire up the oven. Certainly a silver lining to the otherwise-dark cloud.