[NA]Disaster preparedness

[wsuffa]

This week finds me 10 miles E of Birmingham, Alabama. At 0500 I awoke to the sound of the the flashing on the hotel roof being ripped off by a nearby tornado. The tornado warning siren was two blocks away, but since the electricity was the first to go, it was silent. Leeds, Alabama, where we are staying/working got hit pretty hard, but when the afternoon freight train of tornadic fun hit, the sirens were working. The PM storms did little damage to us, but from my 3rd floor window facing
West I could watch the progress of the monster tornado that really hit Birmingham hard. Apparently Tuscaloosa is a disaster and several small communities are simply gone. The radar returns even showed debris returns, and pieces of shingle and insulation were raining down in Birmingham, having been brought up from Tuscaloosa. Sad times for Alabama.

I just saw some pictures on TV. Very sad. Glad you're OK.

 

[Keith Lane]

I just saw some pictures on TV. Very sad. Glad you're OK.

Thanks,we are fine. My wife and kids are tying down all the outdoor stuff and for the first time in ten years we have two cars in our two car garage, as they may get Texas sized hail. If we do get that kind of hail I hope it at least damages my roof enough to get a replacement out the insurance company.

 

[denverpilot]

I hear the skywarn guys like video from folks who do that... and use it in training to say DONT DO THIS!!!

Luckily I did not have a video camera back then. And I knew I was in the wrong place too.

It's amazing how fast a Geo Metro three-banger can go down the only dirt road that led to the road that went the "right" direction to escape.

Unfortunately it wasn't fast enough. Even with a driver who was seriously ****ed off at himself for getting that close without consulting the map and seeing that a giant farm had no north-south roads through it.

I learned a lot chasing. You learn what to look for and in the days before everyone had radar images via mobile data it was a lot more "instinctive" than it is now.

Applied to aviation, I learned "stay the hell away from this stuff", a long ways away, from my time chasing.

Watching a single cell on a dry-line "pop" and trigger a whole line of inflows and outflows and storms, is truly magical from high ground where you can see it all.