Weather Watching Summer 2013

Stormy lead in to summer, Serious storm warnings across our entire region again today. No rain or a deluge. Flash flood warnings, high winds, 'derecheo' , High number of tropical storms predicted for the Atlantic. A shift in the jet stream, more hot days. Weather patterns have shifted in the last 5 years. Local conditions can vary greatly from 'predictions'...

What's a gardener to do?

Lets talk about our daily weather !!! Maybe this can be one of our ongoing threads! 'cause everyone has some weather.

t-storm and downpour right now
very dark!

I have lived in this area all my life and had never heard the term 'derecheo' until last summer. Did we not have this type storm before or is it a new term? Will all 'major' storms be called derecheos now? Are we getting more gloom and doom weather reports, how many 'storm of the century' can we have? What century are they considering?
I get that we should be prepared for storms of any type but I do think the weather people sometimes hype them up too much, I do know it is difficult to determine what the weather patterns will do but sometimes I just turn off the news and just look outside. I think maybe I need a weather rock for the deck.

Looks like our morning onslaught is coming your way Jen. Looking for round two between three and four this afternoon. (Right in the middle of my paper route delivery)

Straight line winds (derecheo) and sopping ground = toppled trees = power outages =

Stay safe all.

Derecho's have a very specific pattern, and the term has been in use (but not widespread) for more than a hundred years.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derecho

Some meteorologists were complaining yesterday that the term derecho was getting thrown around too casually by some of the networks.

Apparently we get a derecho in this region every 4 years or so. There are very specific criteria for a storm to fit the derecho definition (long lived, a certain wind speed, width of storm, etc.).

I think the reason we all noticed last year's derecho is that it was such a bad one where millions of people lost power. I remember hearing the wind approach before the pouring rain started. Boy, that was a frightening storm.

We have had one storm already. Nothing exciting. I have everything ready for the next line of storms that are now headed this way. I am between the Delaware River and the Ocean and our weather can go either way. Sometimes we get the shore forecast and other times we get inland forecast. So, I prepare for the worst and just wait and see what it decides to do.

We lost one of our big old trees on one of those straight line winds several years ago. Nasty winds they are, Just like a tornado only not swirling, just blowing .....I hate them because they just seem to happen. They are predicting them for here today again. I guess it depends on what station on the TV you listen to. We have the weather station radio fortunately, so our weather is usually accurate. It comes from Mt Holly, NJ.

The US Open is having problems getting the play in. Too bad for those people who paid all that money months ago to see the play today.

This is a nice idea Coleup. Thanks. JB

Sunshine out for awhile, now dark again. Heading over to pick up my papers and hoping to deliver many of them before any severe storms start.

Hopefully none of my customers will be tempted to recover any delivered papers if weather is as bad as forecast. Can't afford to loose any of them! Wayne and I have a plan of where to pull over and wait out the storm if unsafe to deliver. Lots of lightning strikes predicted, so staying in my car. At least the weight of all the Fathers' Day ads will keep my little Corolla from blowing all over.
Again, stay safe all.

We're now under a severe storm watch. I hoped this mess would skate just north of us... but sorry y'all will get the brunt of it.

Looks like the weather forecast here has been changed. Just rain and flooding. No damaging winds and dangerous thunder and lightening. I run out between downpours to pull some weeds. Sooo easy when this clay soil is soaked.

Very sunny at the moment and very humid. Going to pick up grandies from science camp at 3. Hoping the next round holds off till we get home.

Whooee, we just had a nasty first leg of the storm pass through. Lost power, rain came in buckets, lots of wind, lightening and thunder... next leg to arrive soon.

Hope it doesn't get too bad Darius!!

They told us the line of severe weather will be going south of us. So, look out and keep your eye on the sky my southern friends. Also, we are still under a severe watch but nothing is happening just now here in Burlington County NJ.

We probably got well over an inch this am. The road out front looked like a stream and our sidewalk looked like a canal. It's been a good while since I've seen it raining so hard that it ran out over the spouting instead of dropping into it.

My, my... these storms opened a sink hole in my yard! It's about 4' in diameter, and I cannot even see the bottom on one side of it.

I grew up with sink holes in Florida, never expected one in Virginia.

We had a fierce storm this morning at about 10 a.m. The sky was black as night and there was thunder and lightning. I arranged to call in to my evening meeting rather than drive over an hour each way in questionable conditions, and of course now it's sunny and hot. But stay tuned - that may change.

I'm thinking that derechos are new to our area; the first one I ever heard of was almost exactly a year ago, and weather people were having a hard time getting their tongues around that name.

At least I don't have to water the garden, but my strawberries are mush.

Oh Darius that stinks, how close is it to your house?

g_g, today I was showing a friend the globe artichokes I have growing, and noticed a couple of red spots amongst the weeds in that bed. I may actually have some strawberries that aren't mush.

Jen, it's probably about 40' from the sinkhole to the house, but maybe only 15' to the root cellar or the spring house. I suspect the sinkhole is just above the underground area that feeds the spring...

That is a concern, Darius!! Be careful

Getting dark again down here in Annapolis. DH is on the road on his way here from NJ. Hope he won't need a boat.

Stay safe Darius. Should you report that to someone? That could keep growing and that would not be a good thing.

We were in a tornado warning at about 2:30pm. The tornado was spotted about 2 miles south of where we live. No damage here. There was also 3 inch sized hail! I am rather glad that didn't hit us!

Karen

I am glad it didn't hit you also

Thank God Karen. I am so glad you were not hit.

Darius, Are you in a limestone area? There are sinkholes extending up the Shenandoah and Cumberland valleys, usually occurring where limestone deposits are widespread. There are many known caves and caverns in those areas also, and by some estimates, as many still to be discovered. I remember an active sinkhole near Pa997, near Greenvillage, in Franklin County, that PennDOT has been dumping road waste in/on for close to 30 years. There usually is a pile there, but sometimes you go past it's just gone.

Ric, mostly it's all silt loam around here, and I've not heard of any caves or caverns within a hundred miles. Of course, I'm a newcomer, just here 6-7 years.

Jeff was crossing end of the bay bridge when the wall of rain hit him. Thankfuly he got across when he did cuz they closed it right after that.

I didn't realize they'd close the bay bridge! Wow! Good thing he got across.

I was glad I'd arranged to attend my meeting by phone, because just when I would have been driving up there the skies opened up and there were sheets of rain along with thunder and lightning.

Glad he made it Jan

Karen, glad your ok

It's pouring here right now

Glad Jeff had a safe crossing.

A few years ago I was on my way from NC to visit a friend in NH when hurricane Hugo came along. I can remember parking in a shopping strip on the west side of the Bay Bridge while I gathered up the courage to cross the bridge in that nasty weather.

I said a few prayers, and started across. By some miracle, the winds and rain slowed to almost nothing until I was all the way across and on Kent Island.

I didn't know they ever closed the Bay Bridge, but it should have been closed then. No hotel/motel rooms available within 200 miles and all the strip mall parking lots were jammed with evacuating travel trailers and boats.

We were spared all that nasty weather. Just some rain. Glad that everyone got thru safely! That sink hole got my attention! What's to be done about it?

I have NO clue what to do about the sink hole. It's a hazard, and I'll contact some authority as soon as I figure out whom to contact.

So much cooler! 59 overnite low, heading up to 70. Rainy.

received another .4" of rain last night, cloudy right now

We're up to well over two inches, including yesterday. We haven't poured it out so we don't know what we got last night, but it's been raining off and on all morning. I was going to prune the suckers and tie up my tomato plants but I'm going to wait until they're good and dry now.

We got 0 rain or storms in my little part of the world yesterday, but there was awful storm damage and possible tornados/water spouts just a few miles away. I am very thankful we were left out of it for a change. I suspect this will be another bad year for storms.

Yes, the sinkhole got my attention also. Good question as to who to call about something like that!! Please keep us updated.

There seas a tornado report near BWI yesterday. We had some intersting moments in the library, discussing what is our shelter area, and do we tell the patrons anything and will we bring them into the meeting room, or what..We did advise them not to leave the building while watchig for an update on the tornado's track. Then the tornado went away.

Power outages in Severna Park today.

TOday, a brand new lovely sunny, breezy day. Its like September, when a hurricane goes thru leaving clear pretty weather after.

Before derecho, we all learned microburst. We saw impressive results of that near hear about five years ago, tons of broken tree limbs.

I'd have no idea who or IF there was help on a sinkhole on my property. Keep us advised please Darius. Fingers crossed.

Darius, do you think you need to get an engineer in to see whether the instability that caused the sinkhole might also put your house at risk?