we're in San Mateo, just south of San Francisco. the wind was howling! the rain pored down. Several big branches of trees crashed down. We had to cut one up to be able to open our gate. For a while the water was so deep I feared it would come in, but it seems to have gone down (I think the tide changed. We're about 8 inches above sea level I think.) This afternoon it settled down to a steady light rain with less wind.
this is an unusually strong storm for here. We're expecting more this weekend.
Kim, I spent 17 years living out on the coast just west of San Mateo. The first house was right across Highway I from the beach. The second was a mile up from the sea, in a narrow canyon that would funnel these storms right up against the side of the house.
This is pretty typical January weather in NorCal -- I've seen them take out eucalyptus and alder trees on our our property. Ugly shit, and parts on the north end (up Marin/Sonoma way) often get dangerously flooded. Because our house was in a very rural area, we've spent a day or two camping out in the house without power more than once, and learned to deal.
Highway 80 closes up several times a winter most years: the stretch from Auburn up through Truckee and down to Reno crosses the roof of the High Sierra, right through the heart of Donner Party country.
So: Nasty, but par for the course in an average winter. You're gonna get a couple of these, and they'll usually come in January or February.
We're having it here, too. (Look at the snow blobs on that map: I'm right in the heart of the northernmost one.) Big old wind shaking the house, freezing, snow likely tonight and over the weekend.
I like snow, so this is OK. In the meantime, there's family and fire and the power's still on.
Wow. For once it's California that's getting the winter nastiness and it's nice in Wisconsin. (The mid-30's is very nice for January in Wisconsin! And it will get up into the 40's tomorrow and Sunday.)
I have relatives in Washington and California, and a friend in Oregon. I'll be trying to make contact with them this weekend.
open weather thread? seems a bit like watching the weather channel? something I never quite understood.
We're getting periodic "wind bursts" within the Puget Sound, along with rain. (One woke me up early, in fact - that's what happens when you live with over a dozen and a half trees around your house, and you're aware of what they can do in bad circumstances.) They are serious (50-60 mph), but so far it appears that we've been spared the worst.
If we get through the windstorm without much damage, what will probably freak folks out today is the possibility of snow in the lowlands sometime on Sunday.
Last year was when our million-plus windstorm happened, and it was no fun for quite a few. The damage to our house was, fortunately, minimal (a huge tree branch slammed onto our roof and poked a small hole, which we caught and covered in time before it could use the branch the broke through the roof as a trickle line for rainwater, thus destroying our living room ceiling in the process).
This year we have food, firewood, and a few extra blankets ready to go.
palamedes
Go Puget Sound go!
wait... did you say, snow sunday?
yikes!
Well being that the weather is very nice in Minnesota I guess this all evens out.
Power was out in the Monterey area for over 12 hours over the course of this storm. These were the heaviest winds I can recall in the 22 years I've lived here. Many trees down, much property damage. No injuries that I am aware of, thankfully.
http://snipurl.com/honkinstorm
Couldn't readily post about this during the 51 1/2 hours our power was out. (Though in fact it was possible to drive into town, in which all the power was out except emergency systems, without taking the circuitous route around mudslides and fallen trees and a washed-out bridge that I had to use two years ago -- the year that the tree across the street fell on our utility wires and onto another neighbor's Mercedes parked on the street, while missing our driveway.)
I beg to differ w Mrs Robinson, however: this was well above the norm. In our nice little woodsy town north of the Golden Gate, we lose power for some hours pretty much every year, but this was in a virtual tie for the longest outage in 20 years. No trees fell on us this year, but a redwood next door broke while my wife was looking out the window. (No cam in hand! Blast!) Didn't uproot itself the way those trees sometimes do. The trunk broke a couple of feet above ground. Never saw the like of it. Weirder: there was no super-powerful wind at the moment.
Alas for news value, it landed among some more trees downslope, and didn't cause any disaster.
The Midwest will shed few tears for our sufferings (leaving aside the few places where terrible things did happen), nor should it. Speaking of 51: that's about the temperature of the unheated part of the house when the power came on today. Damn uncomfortable, I dare say, for those who couldn't heat one room with a fireplace.
Fortunately, only one house in the area had a generator, and much of the time there was a lovely silence, between sheets of rain and howling wind, to accompany the profound darkness.
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