Storms

We had a fun night last night.  More tornado warnings!  We got a weather radio.  Our county's emergency management agency was able to give some away for free, and we were lucky enough to get one.  And it's a good thing, because it's gone off so many times in the last few weeks!  It's gone of every day for the past few days for severe thunderstorms.  Yesterday at about 4:30 it went off again indicating a severe thunderstorm that could possibly produce a tornado.  The radio went off so I turned the news on and was watching to see where the storm was.  The sirens were going off.  And Derrick walked in the door!  I told him he picked a VERY good day to come home early!

I wanted to capture some of the things we saw to fill you westerners in on what it's like in that big of a storm.

First, the weather radio goes off.

And  you hear the sirens.  I took this video so you could hear it.  My camera is pointing to the northwest, where the storm was coming from.

If you can't see it, here is the link

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJNCSHng72k

We watch the news so we can see if we need to take cover.  We never know exactly what all the colors mean, but red is bad and pink is worse.  Those pink places are where a hail core is.

This is my friend Chad.  We've been seeing him a lot lately.  Just recently (two weekends ago?) we were up way late in the night because of some storms that came in with tornado warnings.  They didn't affect us, but they were the storms that produced a lot of tornadoes in Illinois and killed some in Ohio.  There were also tornadoes north of us in Indiana.

They keep a cute little warning box in the corner of your screen between interrupting the shows with news broadcasts, so you can still watch your dove commercials. :)

I took this video at probably the worst part of the storm.

link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VTs5KvEForc

 It didn't get very bad for us. There was a little bit of hail, lots of wind, and tons of lightening. The rain just pours! The thunder echoes here which is why they say rolling thunder.  It's not a big boom and it's over, like in Utah.  It just keeps going and going. That is why Hayden is hiding under the blanket.  I have to be very careful to stay calm around him.  I did a very good job this time.  It really wasn't bad at our house, but there was a lot of damage in other counties.  For some reason, we in are a place where they usually either go north or south of us.  I guess there was a report of a tornado, but it was unconfirmed.  You can see damage it caused in other areas here: http://www.wlfi.com/dpp/news/local/june-14-storm-damage-gallery  I am so grateful we have meteorologists to keep us updated and to warn us of such bad weather!

Our power went out so after the storm passed we had to go out to eat since we couldn't use the stove. (darn)  We'll call that family home evening since our night was so interrupted.