The Great Tulsa Ice Storm of 2007
We all knew it was coming, and boy did it come.
It all started last night around midnight. I was at Jerilyn's watching her newly fixed cable TV. We were watching Tom Brokaw's special on the History Channel about the year 1968. During a commercial we did a quick switch to the local weather channel to see what was happening (besides the loud pounding of freezing rain on the roof.) A few seconds into it, Bzzzzzt, power gone, back on ..., off ..., on for a few seconds, bzzzzt, off. Hmmm. About a minute later, a quick on and final bzzzt. Power gone permanently. Luckily Jerilyn had picked up some logs for the fireplace (already burning) so we had light and heat, and it was actually quite cozy.
Standing outside in the darkness, one could hear the eerie thunder and see the flashes of lightning. Every once in a while, seen by me and others I talked to (even through the evening today), would be a green flash, representing another power transformer blowing up.
Power Transformer Blowing up Caught by Skycam 6 - Tulsa
Seeing as we weren't going to see the rest of the Tom Brokaw special, we hunkered down by the fire, scraggly dog "Alfie " in tow.
We both awoke at the same time to a loud snap, followed by what seemed to be only a few feet away of loud cracking, snapping, and crashing. The whole time praying it didn't come down on us. When it stopped, we went outside to assess the damage. Her tall and old pear tree had broken down the middle into three pieces. A large one falling on the wooden fence, pretty much destroying a large part of it, the second tipping sideways onto and being supported by her and her neighbors gate's fence, and the third resting itself right across the roof, only causing what luckily appears to be some gutter damage.
Our part of town did not seem to get hit as badly as the North side though, apparently whole trees uprooted is common there. Here is an amazing video from a local news channel A tree snaps right behind Channel 2's Julie Chin (raw video).
They are now saying that there are about 180,000 people without power in the Tulsa area, and the Public Service Company of Oklahoma saying it could take up to a week to restore power to everyone. One statistic has even said, "One in three people in Oklahoma are without power." A hard worker and friend at work said today that he was "having lot of company tonight." Later he got a phone call notifying him that his power was out also.
The Tulsa airport was closed today, everything in or out canceled, no power, and of course no de-icers for the airplanes.
AP News
The happy ending is that my place of work (where today I figured out the folly of my ways of confusing sidereal time with solar time), and my apartments on the hill, both have power (for now *knock knock*) Is very strange though as nearly everything across the street from them (my grocery store looking out my window is running on generators), in between of, and looking out from is as black as night. Quite peaceful actually.
We all knew it was coming, and boy did it come.
It all started last night around midnight. I was at Jerilyn's watching her newly fixed cable TV. We were watching Tom Brokaw's special on the History Channel about the year 1968. During a commercial we did a quick switch to the local weather channel to see what was happening (besides the loud pounding of freezing rain on the roof.) A few seconds into it, Bzzzzzt, power gone, back on ..., off ..., on for a few seconds, bzzzzt, off. Hmmm. About a minute later, a quick on and final bzzzt. Power gone permanently. Luckily Jerilyn had picked up some logs for the fireplace (already burning) so we had light and heat, and it was actually quite cozy.
Standing outside in the darkness, one could hear the eerie thunder and see the flashes of lightning. Every once in a while, seen by me and others I talked to (even through the evening today), would be a green flash, representing another power transformer blowing up.
Power Transformer Blowing up Caught by Skycam 6 - Tulsa
Seeing as we weren't going to see the rest of the Tom Brokaw special, we hunkered down by the fire, scraggly dog "Alfie " in tow.
We both awoke at the same time to a loud snap, followed by what seemed to be only a few feet away of loud cracking, snapping, and crashing. The whole time praying it didn't come down on us. When it stopped, we went outside to assess the damage. Her tall and old pear tree had broken down the middle into three pieces. A large one falling on the wooden fence, pretty much destroying a large part of it, the second tipping sideways onto and being supported by her and her neighbors gate's fence, and the third resting itself right across the roof, only causing what luckily appears to be some gutter damage.
Our part of town did not seem to get hit as badly as the North side though, apparently whole trees uprooted is common there. Here is an amazing video from a local news channel A tree snaps right behind Channel 2's Julie Chin (raw video).
They are now saying that there are about 180,000 people without power in the Tulsa area, and the Public Service Company of Oklahoma saying it could take up to a week to restore power to everyone. One statistic has even said, "One in three people in Oklahoma are without power." A hard worker and friend at work said today that he was "having lot of company tonight." Later he got a phone call notifying him that his power was out also.
The Tulsa airport was closed today, everything in or out canceled, no power, and of course no de-icers for the airplanes.
AP News
The happy ending is that my place of work (where today I figured out the folly of my ways of confusing sidereal time with solar time), and my apartments on the hill, both have power (for now *knock knock*) Is very strange though as nearly everything across the street from them (my grocery store looking out my window is running on generators), in between of, and looking out from is as black as night. Quite peaceful actually.
A View of Tulsa Mayhem
UPDATE: To celebrate Armageddon, Jerilyn just came back with a gingerbread house making kit.
posted by AlexanderTheGreat at 7:00 PM
9 Comments:
Scary! I'm happy to be rid of all my big trees - finally. I don't think I ever posted the photo of the oak next door that the guy (named Guy) finally took down in the summer - and then took until last week to actually REMOVE. It was over 6 feet across and completely hollow - and had been leaning over my house for as long as we've lived here. In the summer of 2006 we had something called a "microburst" that took down zillions of huge old trees all at once. Also scary!
So I commented before I heard the whole story - just saw the link to the video. Glad you area both safe - have fun with the gingerbread house!
Wow that was quick, hadn't even had time to correct the typos. Are you getting an RSS somehow?
Looking for suggestions for candy to put on the GH, not that many candy shops are open right now (or exist in Tulsa.)
WOW! It all looks so surreal and scary! What's the forecast? Are things going to improve anytime soon?
Keep us updated and stay safe!
Glad you are OK--all sounds so scary! I think I would have turned to gingerbread then, too--
Beecher
Yes. RSS rocks! I get everything in one place now, in Thunderbird, including Gmail.
What a difference from when Dad and I were in Tulsa - that weekend I felt like I was on vacation in California - especially with the breeze we enjoyed sitting on the balcony at your hilltop apartment! Good grief! Stay safe and stay warm in front of the fire (better stock up on fireplace logs) and try not to eat ALL of the gingerbread house at one time. . . (try different colored jelly beans to decorate the gingerbread house, if you can find them. They are pretty common. Look in Walgreens at the bottom of the hill, they always have a variety of bagged candy)
Diana
Glad everyone is safe. I heard that people are also without water. And just go ahead and eat the gingerbread.
All is well at my place for the moment. Temperatures have warmed up and melted the ice.
Today I can still look out from my tower of work and see great patches of black though.
As I said, some places got it a LOT worse than we did. Still over 100 thousand people without power in Tulsa (nearly everybody I know.)
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