Friday, July 30, 2010

A Wild Time In The Old Town Tonight


Not an evening to be on the golf course..... Posted by Picasa

"The lightning flashes through my skull; mine eyeballs ache and ache; my whole beaten brain seems as beheaded, and rolling on some stunning ground." ~ Herman Melville (American Novelist from Moby Dick. 1819-1891)
OK, so the evening was not as dramatic as fighting the huge white whale, but it was unusual to say the least. It was hot today... again... and humid, again. We had a chance of thunderstorms but until 5 PM, nothing really looked like it would materialize. Then the clouds rolled in and darkened and thickened up. Lightning was seen in the distance and a very mild rolling thunder. On radar, it seemed that red and yellow on green was popping up all around us, but here.. on the little "x" representing our house, it was cloudy but not dark. We moved a few plants to shelter and secured several loose objects and a few sprinkles started and just as quickly stopped. We were in a proverbial doughnut hole... storms to the east, west, north and south, but none overhead.

Then around 7:30 the doughnut seemed to start collapsing all around... a reported tornado over near Oceana and a thunderstorm warning.... but it came right when the skies seemed to be starting to clear. Then quickly it began to rain.. big droplets, then more and thunder and lightning in the north and east with a wall cloud dropping down. The winds blew rain from the east, then from the north and west and the local weathermen began to notice circulation in the clouds right over our area. The trees in the preserve were bent over, thankfully away from the house. Sustained winds lifted the hot tub cover partially off and started moving one of the deck chairs around. It rained over an inch in the span of a half an hour and Virginia Beach received even more... almost 5 inches. The wind blown rain worked its way into the brick and a small drip in the sunroom started and then stopped just as quickly.

The rain and wind stopped and we breathed a sigh of relief... Daisy took quite a while to calm down and stop trembling. The biggest casualty was my bird feeder system. I should have taken the individual feeders off, but didn't think about it and the wind bent it over into the rose garden and snapped the metal pole off about 18 inches out of the ground. Bird seed is everywhere and one of the roses is broken, but will survive. I didn't look at the rest of the flowers, but most on the patio were fine. Our neighbors had a tree branch fall and hit their back fence and it broke one section out but I think that is the only tree down back in our little nook.

We had another round of rousing lightning fireworks and thunder with rain come through a bit later, but thankfully, without the wind. Stephen wanted to view a storm from the sunroom, but I don't think he had one this bad in mind. Now, perhaps my personal meteorologist, Nyssa, could explain exactly what this doughnut thing was all about....

PS: There were some crazy golfers out on the course while the wall cloud with lightning got closer and closer. Some people have more passion for golf than sense.

(end of post)

Skywatch Friday Post

8 comments:

Ginny Hartzler said...

Yipes ! How did you ever get this picture? How would you know when the lightening was coming? It's amazing. We got the same thing!! About 3:30 here, and without the donut and twirly multi direction wind. Over and inch in maybe 20 minutes. The wind so strong that the rain came in all under the basement door. Golfers are famous for this, my husband was playing tennis right before a big storm with lightening, GADS! I'm so glad you only sustained this slight damage. Did you watch from the sunroom? I would have been too scared.

utenzi said...

It was a little stormy here also, around 11pm, but nothing like what you had. Just a bit of lightning and thunder for us---but mostly rain. Nice picture, Roxanne!

manang kim said...

I am so amazed to this kind of shots. Very beautiful! Thanks for sharing!



SWF~Fiery

greensborodailyphoto@gmail.com said...

capturing the lightning at just that point in time is a real feat. Yes, golfers, swimmers, many of us just don't read the cues to get out of its firey way! Happy SWF we posted beside each other and I always try to visit neighbors!

Sandra said...

our area is the lighning capital of the USA and golfers get struck by lightning about once a month during the summer. that is a really good shot of the strike. did you use a tripod? i have tried and can't seem to get a shot of one. sounds like a wild night to me, glad no more damage was done than was. we need rain despartely and when it comes it will come with fireworks. the past 3 days at noon playtime with our dogs the temp is dead on 100 with blankets of wet heat that makes it hard to breathe

Halcyon said...

You definitely don't want to be out on the course in that weather!

A great lightning shot though, those are hard to come by!

Karen said...

I love photos of lightening. We've had our share of storms this past week or two.  Finally a sunny day today.  And, yeah, golfers are crazy!

Lori said...

Love the picture.  I can never get lightening at the right time like this!  So glad you're safe and sound.  These storms have been terrific this spring/summer.