It definitely makes a sound...
It's been a gorgeous day, weather-wise. I rose fairly early and did some errands, took the excuse to stop by Dunkin' Donuts for some coffee, and then headed to the first "Scenic Overlook" on the GW Parkway to sit and read in the warm air and cool breeze. (And while sitting on the rocks and looking out at the water, I noticed something crawling next to me. I think it was a newt, with a brilliant bluish-purple tail!)
Because I felt like cruising around completing tasks at my leisure, I decided not to take the highway, Rt. 66, which runs right past my apartment building. Granted, it was hours too early for anything to happen, but it still seems a bit jarring to think that of all days, I decided not to head in that direction.
By 1:30p.m. or so, I was back in my apartment, calmly sitting on my bed, delving into the copious amounts of material I had brought back from the libraries I visited this morning. I had turned my air conditioner off, but, absorbed in a book, I forgot to open the window. *crrrrrrreeeeaaaakkk*... I looked up. There was a cracking sound somewhere that reminded me of ice breaking, and a WHUMP that sure sounded like ice falling off a roof and hitting the ground. But it's August, and it's the first "cool" day we've had all month... *beep beep* *brakes screech* *CRUNCH* *distant screams*
I jumped up to my window and saw all my pool-side neighbors running to the fence, whipping out their cell-phones, waving to people on the road. Cars on 66 westbound were pulling over quickly and people were jumping out of the cars and running down the middle of the highway, too far to my left for me to see them. I could hear a woman screaming, "Oh my God!" over and over. She was wailing loud enough for me to make out exactly what she was saying, and my window was closed, I am six stories up that side of the building, and at least 100 yards away as the crow flies from whatever was happening on the highway, and I have a hearing problem. Some people at the fence covered their mouths and the woman kept screaming, as I opened my window to try to make some sense of what was going on. Oh, that guttural scream of pain, shock and disbelief. Everything is fine now and I still can't get it out of my head. I can't connect the scream with this no-nonsense news report.
Afraid I was going to come upon a scene of someone impaled or bleeding profusely or just plain dead right in front of me, I was still morbidly curious. I yanked my shoes on and grabbed my keys and glasses, and got down to the yard as fast as I could. I soon learned from my neighbors that a tree had fallen, and I went to a different part of the yard to get a better look. Pardon the low-res, through-the-chain-link, shaky-hand pictures.
Just... crazy. People always amaze me. There in the middle of the road were a good 20 people working together to pull branches out of the way, throwing many over the guardrail to the north. Some travelers headed eastbound stopped their cars and jumped the median to assist. Thanks to my neighbors, drivers on the highway, and bikers on the Custis trail, Arlington County Police and Fire were right there on the scene. God bless you, ACPD, ACFD. You guys-and-the-one-girl ROCK. The Staties sorta stood around. Ok, whatever.
The firefighters had chainsaws, a broom, a shovel, and something the neighbor I chatted with for an hour termed a "crazy rake."
It was amazing how efficiently everything went. Sure, I would have been ticked if I was stuck in traffic, because you never know what up ahead is causing the backup, but this was such a freak occurrence and was being dealt with very quickly. I strained to see if a far away car with a ruined bumper and completely shot out front left tire was still there. A tow truck arrived to haul away the biggest logs that the chainsaw couldn't make it through. My neighbor was dumbstruck by that black car that had stopped RIGHT BEFORE the tree. "Those are the luckiest people I have ever seen in my life, " he kept saying. I shudder to imagine what this gigantic tree must have looked like in the road before them, and the desperate brake-slamming that actually succeeded. The front bumper was a little dinged, and there was sawdust all over the hood, but not even a crack in the windscreen.
CRAZY. We watched until the roadway was fairly cleared of the debris. I wasn't even outside an hour.
Whoa. Again, MAJOR props to the police and firefighters. Well done. *whistles*