Monday night we had a sudden strong storm hit our city. Very strong winds, especially in the west and southwest areas. That is our neighborhood.
At 11:25 pm we awoke to a loud wind and the house shaking. First we ran to check the view from the kitchen deck window.
Oh my, I had forgotten to put down our one umbrella and it was a twisted, bent over mess, with the fabric and the ribs hanging over the side of the deck.
Next we checked the front view outside our dining room window. Oh my, there were huge branches leaning on our house. At that point we weren't sure if we had much of a tree yet. This is our 19-year old maple tree. In the morning this is what we found.
And of course the electricity was out from 11:30 pm the night before. There were 14,000 homes without power in Columbia. Suffice it to say it took many crews, from other towns around as well as ours, to get us all up and running. We did not get power back until Thursday evening. By last night the city was restored.
We were lucky in that our church was only without electricity for 16 hours. Paul got to get back to the office and AC Tuesday afternoon. I went to our daughter and son-in-law's condo which had power during the afternoons. We slept at our house because it was relatively cool and low humidity, so open windows at night brought the house temp down to 73. During the days without power our interior temp only got to 78. We have good insulation!
I am exceedingly grateful we did not have worse damage. There were several homes destroyed when large trees fell on them. Others had holes in roofs or storage sheds were damaged. As we drive around our area, there are so many trees down, some from the base, and many large branches.
During this time I also gave thanks to God that we didn't have the destruction of a tornado. I imagined getting out of our home and having nothing left, and our neighborhood being demolished. The few days of no power was nothing compared to other kinds of destruction or living conditions (think war-torn countries, etc.).
So now I have to get organized and do cleaning and organizational projects I was going to do during the days we were in the dark! And I'm thankful I have such tasks to accomplish.
Next we checked the front view outside our dining room window. Oh my, there were huge branches leaning on our house. At that point we weren't sure if we had much of a tree yet. This is our 19-year old maple tree. In the morning this is what we found.
We were lucky in that our church was only without electricity for 16 hours. Paul got to get back to the office and AC Tuesday afternoon. I went to our daughter and son-in-law's condo which had power during the afternoons. We slept at our house because it was relatively cool and low humidity, so open windows at night brought the house temp down to 73. During the days without power our interior temp only got to 78. We have good insulation!
I am exceedingly grateful we did not have worse damage. There were several homes destroyed when large trees fell on them. Others had holes in roofs or storage sheds were damaged. As we drive around our area, there are so many trees down, some from the base, and many large branches.
During this time I also gave thanks to God that we didn't have the destruction of a tornado. I imagined getting out of our home and having nothing left, and our neighborhood being demolished. The few days of no power was nothing compared to other kinds of destruction or living conditions (think war-torn countries, etc.).
So now I have to get organized and do cleaning and organizational projects I was going to do during the days we were in the dark! And I'm thankful I have such tasks to accomplish.
