(no subject)
Wow. The weather here has been C-R-A-Z-Y!
It's been stormy for at least the past week or so, especially for the past two or three days. I always seem to work during these mega storms.
Today there was a tornado warning for my county. Apparently a tornado touched down in West Chicago, ripping the roof off of a warehouse. That's only approximately 4 miles away from where I work. The lightning was something fierce and the thunder was making our windows shudder. The power flickered at least four times today, for 20 seconds at most. Luckily all of the computers have a battery back up, so it wasn't a problem even though I was in the middle of a credit card transaction during one. At one point I looked out one of the cafe windows across the store and it looked like we were under water (not flooding, it just looked that way because it was raining so hard). Visibility was extremely low because the rain was falling so fast and hard.
I couldn't get a good view of the sky or lightning from my position at the register, but when I had the chance to look out I noticed that the sky was green and it looked like dusk even though it was only 5pm.
Later in the night (probably around 8:30pm) a lady I checked out showed me some pictures she took of the sky from her home. I'm not sure what time she took them at but the entire sky was blood red. They were realllllly creepy pictures.
Even though the tornado warning ended, we were still under a severe thunderstorm watch/warning for most of the night. I thought it was pretty much over, but by the time I left at 11pm the lightning was still going strong. Luckily the rain had stopped at least for the ten minute drive home. The lighting was absolutely spectacular. It was constant, with bolts going off in several parts of the sky at once. I was in the middle of it all because it was going off straight above my head. HUGE bolts of lightning, thick, purple, making the sky look like it had cracked open all the way across. I know that the rubber tires help prevent getting struck by, but I sure was anxious to get home.
The storm is still going strong with thick rain, lighting and thunder. So far we've had power through it all (although a large proportion of the county has blacked out), so I'm grateful for that. My house is also on a bit of a hill, so we've never had any problems with flooding. I'm sure my neighbors houses have started flooding in their basements though. The retention ponds have probably over flowed, but I haven't seen them since Tuesday.
I normally LOVE thunderstorms, but the ones today were really ferocious and freaked me out a little bit. I think I just didn't like being at work during them. At home at least I know I can duck it out in my basement and can try to store our valuables and irreplaceables away somewhere safe, but there is no basement at work and we don't even have a tornado safe wall. The only load bearing interior wall is lined with humongous floor to ceiling bookshelves that I wouldn't trust not to fall and crack my skull open. and since I worked register today the entire wall behind me is floor to ceiling plate glass windows. Plus we can't hear tornado sirens and we don't get a chance to check the weather report very often (although James taught me how to check weather.com from all of the computers today). It also doesn't help that we remained open for business and didn't even ANNOUNCE that there was a tornado warning over the PA. We all went along like nothing was wrong, although I warned of the customers I checked out about the warning and invited them to wait it out in the back of the store away from all of the windows.
I should consider myself lucky though. We could have it a lot worse. We haven't had to deal with any flooding or sustained power outages. We haven't been hit by tornado or had any substantial wind damages. Let's all hope it stays that way.
I hope everyone else is safe and sound.
It's been stormy for at least the past week or so, especially for the past two or three days. I always seem to work during these mega storms.
Today there was a tornado warning for my county. Apparently a tornado touched down in West Chicago, ripping the roof off of a warehouse. That's only approximately 4 miles away from where I work. The lightning was something fierce and the thunder was making our windows shudder. The power flickered at least four times today, for 20 seconds at most. Luckily all of the computers have a battery back up, so it wasn't a problem even though I was in the middle of a credit card transaction during one. At one point I looked out one of the cafe windows across the store and it looked like we were under water (not flooding, it just looked that way because it was raining so hard). Visibility was extremely low because the rain was falling so fast and hard.
I couldn't get a good view of the sky or lightning from my position at the register, but when I had the chance to look out I noticed that the sky was green and it looked like dusk even though it was only 5pm.
Later in the night (probably around 8:30pm) a lady I checked out showed me some pictures she took of the sky from her home. I'm not sure what time she took them at but the entire sky was blood red. They were realllllly creepy pictures.
Even though the tornado warning ended, we were still under a severe thunderstorm watch/warning for most of the night. I thought it was pretty much over, but by the time I left at 11pm the lightning was still going strong. Luckily the rain had stopped at least for the ten minute drive home. The lighting was absolutely spectacular. It was constant, with bolts going off in several parts of the sky at once. I was in the middle of it all because it was going off straight above my head. HUGE bolts of lightning, thick, purple, making the sky look like it had cracked open all the way across. I know that the rubber tires help prevent getting struck by, but I sure was anxious to get home.
The storm is still going strong with thick rain, lighting and thunder. So far we've had power through it all (although a large proportion of the county has blacked out), so I'm grateful for that. My house is also on a bit of a hill, so we've never had any problems with flooding. I'm sure my neighbors houses have started flooding in their basements though. The retention ponds have probably over flowed, but I haven't seen them since Tuesday.
I normally LOVE thunderstorms, but the ones today were really ferocious and freaked me out a little bit. I think I just didn't like being at work during them. At home at least I know I can duck it out in my basement and can try to store our valuables and irreplaceables away somewhere safe, but there is no basement at work and we don't even have a tornado safe wall. The only load bearing interior wall is lined with humongous floor to ceiling bookshelves that I wouldn't trust not to fall and crack my skull open. and since I worked register today the entire wall behind me is floor to ceiling plate glass windows. Plus we can't hear tornado sirens and we don't get a chance to check the weather report very often (although James taught me how to check weather.com from all of the computers today). It also doesn't help that we remained open for business and didn't even ANNOUNCE that there was a tornado warning over the PA. We all went along like nothing was wrong, although I warned of the customers I checked out about the warning and invited them to wait it out in the back of the store away from all of the windows.
I should consider myself lucky though. We could have it a lot worse. We haven't had to deal with any flooding or sustained power outages. We haven't been hit by tornado or had any substantial wind damages. Let's all hope it stays that way.
I hope everyone else is safe and sound.