August 10 Severe Weather

[Hoosier]

4 minutes ago, cyclone77 said:

jinx 

Do you have a generator so you could at least hook up your fridge or something?

[weatherbo]

28 minutes ago, cyclone77 said:

jinx 

It must be tore up there.  Are you gonna post your time lapse vid?

[Chicago Storm]

Hawkeye and surrounding folks of Cedar Rapids better have some damn good pictures/video to share when they get power back in another week or two.

The more I hear about how things went there and see pictures/video from there, the more I want.


.

[Hoosier]

LOT confirmed another tornado in the southern suburbs.  3 tornadoes have now been confirmed in Cook county, which is the first time there have been 3 in a day in Cook co since 6/7/2008.  

[Chicago Storm]

This map is actually a good illustration of how the derecho quickly changed character rapidly as it pushed into the LOT CWA.

It went from vortex dominant across DSM/DVN CWA’s, to MV dominant fairly quickly into the LOT CWA. My best guess on why this happened is...For one, the derecho had entered a post-mature stage...Second, the main vortex that moved from north of DSM-Marshalltown-CID eventually weakened as it encountered a disturbed environment from the RFD supercell. At this time it became more MV dominated.



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[cyclone77]

1 hour ago, Hoosier said:

Do you have a generator so you could at least hook up your fridge or something?

All the neighbors do.  The fridge/freezer stuff is history. Will prob invest in a cheap one to at least keep that going for next time.

[cyclone77]

56 minutes ago, weatherbo said:

It must be tore up there.  Are you gonna post your time lapse vid?

Gotta wait till power comes back lol

[cyclone77]

50 minutes ago, Chicago Storm said:

Hawkeye and surrounding folks of Cedar Rapids better have some damn good pictures/video to share when they get power back in another week or two.

The more I hear about how things went there and see pictures/video from there, the more I want.


.

Yeah as bad as it was here in the QCA it was way worse there.  We prob topped out around 75mph max here, maybe 80, and CR was at or over 100mph which is a huge difference damage wise.

[Chicago Storm]

Gotta wait till power comes back lol

But we want it nowwwww.


.

[Torchageddon]

49 minutes ago, cyclone77 said:

All the neighbors do.  The fridge/freezer stuff is history. Will prob invest in a cheap one to at least keep that going for next time.

Did you cook up the more expensive frozen food before it spoiled? BBQ?

[hlcater]

Okay, I've got power and some time to upload/give an account so let's do it. Like I said the morning of, I had been suspicious of derecho potential monday but seeing how my call sunday didnt pan out due to poor convective evolution in the morning, I wasn't gonna bust twice, so I just put a sock in it. Once I saw the storms forming in NE though, I knew it was game on, as that seemed to be the biggest differentiator. If storms didn't initiate/organize in NE, they probably weren't going to at all. 

With that out of the way, I worked at 3pm so I couldn't afford to go meet the derecho out in the middle of the countryside, so I met it 3-4 miles west of Fairfax. The storm caught me before I was ready and I was expecting the strongest winds right along the gust front but interestingly, my location was such that the strongest winds took awhile to arrive and I distinctly remember thinking "wow, this sucks. 120mph aloft and I'm only gusting to maybe 60mph". Perhaps its best the strongest winds waited, as it gave me time to scout out a nice spot in a corn field where I'd be safe from powerlines/trees. Not shortly after, the core of wind which I estimate consisted of gusts to ~100mph arrived. From that point on, I was just along for the ride. Strongest winds persisted roughly 5-10 minutes, but wind gusts of severe criteria lasted 45 at least. 

This dash video is the strongest 5-10 minutes of wind. With winds from about 1:30 to 5 minutes being especially intense. Nick Stewart's video is very similar to mine.

A farm about half a mile downstream from me suffered heavy tree damage and a grain silo of theirs was tossed/rolled probably 100yds into a field. I made my way towards Fairfax, which had suffered heavy damage, with many trees and powerlines down and one building completely destroyed and its contents strewn downstream.

 

Getting from Fairfax to downtown took an eternity. Most roads were a standstill, and on the stretch of 380 from hwy 30 to H avenue, I counted 8 overturned semis. It took me well over an hour to drive about 10 miles. I worked for the rest of the day(hospital ER) and we were so overwhelmed with the amount of thankfully minor injuries(trees, glass, ceiling collapses, overturned semis, that sort of thing) that we were treating people in the hallways and had to open up overflow areas. The fact the entire city was without power exacerbated the issue. This last pic was from Hiawatha from a family member. I worked the next day as well, so don't have much there.

 

That's the initial experience and pics from the first day, but I'm not done yet  .

[hlcater]

I had time to drive around quite a bit yesterday and traced what was essentially a big X across much of Linn County. From this, two areas of especially intense damage were found. The first being up near Robins/Hiawatha/Midway/Marion, and the second being along US 30 into the SW side of CR and Fairfax. 

This forest blowdown was near Midway and about half of all trees were snapped, and the ones left had suffered heavy foliage/limb damage. This was not far from the 112mph report, though part of me wonders if the winds that caused damage like that weren't higher?

Impressive damage from Marion. Particularly the apartment building that lost roofing.

 

This  high tension power line was downed about 2 miles west of Palo. 4 of these were toppled in a row. Another one of those DIs that suggest winds of at least 100mph.

 

The next two pictures are from the US 30 corridor near Atkins.

 

 

These are from the SW side. The damage here was the most intense I was able to find. Especially the damage to the MAC and surrounding apartments (shown).

 

 

 

 

We were without power for 3 days, having it restored at about 11pm last night. We were one of the first areas to have their power returned yesterday. As of now, many areas of CR(roughly 60%) still have no power and some areas are still blocked due to tree falls and downed lines even 4 days later. This is the worst derecho I have ever experienced and I'm not sure if the scale of destruction from it can be accurately described, especially on the corn crop (as stated already) and will have a lasting impact on Cedar Rapids, both on the surviving trees and in memory. It was like an intense RFD, but lasting 3 times as long and 5 times as wide. 

 

Here are two additional albums of pictures.

https://imgur.com/a/dvhGA87

https://imgur.com/a/sqSl6Cm

[cyclone77]

3 hours ago, Torchageddon said:

Did you cook up the more expensive frozen food before it spoiled? BBQ?

Yeah salvaged some items with a big cooler and free ice from the gas station which was cool of them ( no pun intended lol).  

Com Ed still has 11pm tomorrow night restoration estimate.  There was a very large uprooted tree that took down the wires a few streets over that had laid untouched until today.  The tree is now gone but all the wires are still spaghetti'd through several front yards. I'm guessing that's the last holdup.

[cyclone77]

1 hour ago, hlcater said:

Okay, I've got power and some time to upload/give an account so let's do it. Like I said the morning of, I had been suspicious of derecho potential monday but seeing how my call sunday didnt pan out due to poor convective evolution in the morning, I wasn't gonna bust twice, so I just put a sock in it. Once I saw the storms forming in NE though, I knew it was game on, as that seemed to be the biggest differentiator. If storms didn't initiate/organize in NE, they probably weren't going to at all. 

With that out of the way, I worked at 3pm so I couldn't afford to go meet the derecho out in the middle of the countryside, so I met it 3-4 miles west of Fairfax. The storm caught me before I was ready and I was expecting the strongest winds right along the gust front but interestingly, my location was such that the strongest winds took awhile to arrive and I distinctly remember thinking "wow, this sucks. 120mph aloft and I'm only gusting to maybe 60mph". Perhaps its best the strongest winds waited, as it gave me time to scout out a nice spot in a corn field where I'd be safe from powerlines/trees. Not shortly after, the core of wind which I estimate consisted of gusts to ~100mph arrived. From that point on, I was just along for the ride. Strongest winds persisted roughly 5-10 minutes, but wind gusts of severe criteria lasted 45 at least. 

This dash video is the strongest 5-10 minutes of wind. With winds from about 1:30 to 5 minutes being especially intense. Nick Stewart's video is very similar to mine.

A farm about half a mile downstream from me suffered heavy tree damage and a grain silo of theirs was tossed/rolled probably 100yds into a field. I made my way towards Fairfax, which had suffered heavy damage, with many trees and powerlines down and one building completely destroyed and its contents strewn downstream.

 

Getting from Fairfax to downtown took an eternity. Most roads were a standstill, and on the stretch of 380 from hwy 30 to H avenue, I counted 8 overturned semis. It took me well over an hour to drive about 10 miles. I worked for the rest of the day(hospital ER) and we were so overwhelmed with the amount of thankfully minor injuries(trees, glass, ceiling collapses, overturned semis, that sort of thing) that we were treating people in the hallways and had to open up overflow areas. The fact the entire city was without power exacerbated the issue. This last pic was from Hiawatha from a family member. I worked the next day as well, so don't have much there.

 

That's the initial experience and pics from the first day, but I'm not done yet  .

Nice!  

I was too chickenshit to watch out the west facing window, so I watched out the front (east side).  It was quite still and very warm/humid as the shelf cloud rolled in overhead.  Then there was a slight bit of breeze and a slight feeling of cooler air, perhaps 15mph wind as things began to stir.  You could really sense the tension, something big was coming.  Then the main wind hit so fast it startled me, even though I was ready for it.  BAM!!! The front tree bent way over and looked like it was about to shear right off, but luckily it held.  That same initial gust destroyed the neighbor across the street's walnut tree.  After that first big gust it stayed pretty windy, but sort of run-of-the-mill squall line stuff- 50-55mph.  The heavy rain hit but the winds didn't really get much stronger, still 50-55mph type stuff.  It was after the heavy rain from the squall line moved on when the consistent 60-70mph winds rolled in.  It really reminded me of how it's like when you get strong wake low winds.  Very strong winds with light rain falling after the main storm, but in this case the winds were still from the same direction, and WAY stronger than a wake low wind event.  That continued for a good 45 minutes before finally winding down.  

[hlcater]

16 minutes ago, cyclone77 said:

Nice!  

I was too chickenshit to watch out the west facing window, so I watched out the front (east side).  It was quite still and very warm/humid as the shelf cloud rolled in overhead.  Then there was a slight bit of breeze and a slight feeling of cooler air, perhaps 15mph wind as things began to stir.  You could really sense the tension, something big was coming.  Then the main wind hit so fast it startled me, even though I was ready for it.  BAM!!! The front tree bent way over and looked like it was about to shear right off, but luckily it held.  That same initial gust destroyed the neighbor across the street's walnut tree.  After that first big gust it stayed pretty windy, but sort of run-of-the-mill squall line stuff- 50-55mph.  The heavy rain hit but the winds didn't really get much stronger, still 50-55mph type stuff.  It was after the heavy rain from the squall line moved on when the consistent 60-70mph winds rolled in.  It really reminded me of how it's like when you get strong wake low winds.  Very strong winds with light rain falling after the main storm, but in this case the winds were still from the same direction, and WAY stronger than a wake low wind event.  That continued for a good 45 minutes before finally winding down.  

Oh yea, the same thing happened here. I probably had 70mph gusts and perhaps 1 or 2 to near 80 well after the video above was taken, though they were difficult to quantify on video due to the lack of precip. What I really like about that video is that you can hear the "impact" of the really high winds against the car as the deep whoosh as the big clouds of mist blow by. Being in that singlehandedly motivated me to order a Kestrel 3000 for next time so I dont have to guess whether the winds are pretty strong or really strong. Confident in 100mph primarily due to damage and proximity to Nick Stewart, who measured 100mph.

[Hoosier]

Thanks for your accounts guys.  

I have noticed in some of the better straight line wind events/derechos that you can sometimes hear the wind in the distance maybe 30 or 60 seconds before it hits... if you're in a quiet environment of course.  Did you guys experience that or not?

[andyhb]

This might be the clearest video yet of the ferocity that some of these gusts in the derecho reached.

Tough to estimate exact numbers as usual, but the second half of this clip looks right in line with some mid-range hurricanes I've seen in terms of intensity/sound.

[hlcater]

There's a 109mph report from 3 N Atkins on the LSR page. That's about 5 miles from where I was. I was 2-3S of Atkins.

[hlcater]

14 minutes ago, Hoosier said:

Thanks for your accounts guys.  

I have noticed in some of the better straight line wind events/derechos that you can sometimes hear the wind in the distance maybe 30 or 60 seconds before it hits... if you're in a quiet environment of course.  Did you guys experience that or not?

Not really, primarily because the onset was slow and I was busy trying to find the best/safest spot to ride out the storm

[cyclone77]

27 minutes ago, Hoosier said:

Thanks for your accounts guys.  

I have noticed in some of the better straight line wind events/derechos that you can sometimes hear the wind in the distance maybe 30 or 60 seconds before it hits... if you're in a quiet environment of course.  Did you guys experience that or not?

I was inside so not sure.  

[Hoosier]

2 minutes ago, cyclone77 said:

I was inside so not sure.  

One time I remember hearing it off in the distance inside the house with the windows shut (no tv or any other background noise).  It was in May 2000 just before midnight.  It was dead calm and then it hit.  The power went out and then I backed away from the window because it was looking a little crazy.  Lost a lot of branches and a tree was uprooted down the street.   

[cyclone77]

Here's a vid from a little northwest of here near Fulton.  Lots of trees blocking the main route north/south.

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=3469861626392139&id=100001050069622

[andyhb]

Quite a few 80-90+ mph reports added in IL via damage surveys (probably some as a result of differentiating from tornado damage). Also a 100 mph report added for Forreston in Ogle County.

[OSUmetstud]

On 8/13/2020 at 3:13 AM, purduewx80 said:

Initial estimates of crop damage alone are $3.4 billion. Who'd have thought an August derecho would be on 2020's list of billion dollar disasters?

 

Crazy. Is this the most expensive one in history? 

[IWXwx]

7 hours ago, Hoosier said:

Thanks for your accounts guys.  

I have noticed in some of the better straight line wind events/derechos that you can sometimes hear the wind in the distance maybe 30 or 60 seconds before it hits... if you're in a quiet environment of course.  Did you guys experience that or not?

With our June 10th storm, our EMA Facebook page lit up with people wondering what the low roar was that they heard as the storm approached. It was a localized event in a small town (Andrews, IN). While doing damage assessments, several residents also commented on it and asked if it was a tornado due to the roar. I've only heard it a couple of times in my life from straight-line winds. Eerie stuff.

[cyclone77]

Time lapse from Monday.  Might take a bit for 4K to be available, as sometimes it takes an hour or so to be fully ready.  

Shot at wide angle, so looks best on full screen.

EDIT:  I left in a decent amount of footage before the storm hit to illustrate how nice and peaceful the day had been.  Storm hits around 2 min mark.

 

[A-L-E-K]

Insane high end event 

[andyhb]

So apparently DVN has decided to not survey this event. That's honestly pretty sad considering the impact of this thing.

[A-L-E-K]

More

[CheeselandSkies]

Some of those pictures posted by @hlcater resemble major hurricane damage (such as Panama City after Michael).