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Worst Weather You Have Been Through

Started by SignGeek101, May 16, 2015, 06:32:03 PM

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SignGeek101

What is the worst weather you have been through that you remember, while you were driving or otherwise?

I've never driven through a nasty storm, but as a passenger, there were a few times where I've seen funnel clouds and a possible tornado.



jeffandnicole

I seem to miss the nasty weather.  I was down in Florida when Superstorm Sandy hit the area (as it turned out, my house was one of the few in the state that didn't lose electric during that storm!)

Driving-wise, I've been thru the typical thunderstorms and such which slows traffic to a crawl out of necessity because you simply can't see anything.  The worst I experienced was a fairly typical mid-day snowstorm; but when traffic lets out all at once during the day and the traffic lights aren't timed for a mid-day rush hour, it took a while just to leave the city.  The highway wasn't much faster.  All together, a normal 45-60 minute commute took 4 1/2 hours.

Zeffy

The worst was when I was caught in the middle of a hurricane back down in Florida in 1998 (1997?). I don't remember which one it was, but my family and I were in Miami, and we tried to get out of our hotel we were staying at by taking the elevator. Then the elevator died.

Other than that, the other two worst that come to mind are Superstorm Sandy and Hurricane Irene.
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empirestate

The worst, as in scariest, weather I've been through, I was indeed driving. It was a severe thunderstorm just north of Mt. Gretna, PA; I could see there was a storm just over the ridge, but as I came down the other side all hell broke loose. Torrential rain and high winds, yes, but lightning as I've never seen before, striking on all four sides of me at a rate approaching once per second.

It was the only time I've ever felt genuinely concerned for my life in a thunderstorm because of the intensity and proximity of the lightning. I was only a mile or two from home, and I wanted to get there as quickly as possible, but of course I got stuck behind another driver who decided to slow down almost completely (not that you could blame him, given the rain). When I did finally get home, I realized I'd left my bedroom window wide open by accident, and while I was initially glad to find the area below the window bone-dry, this was short-lived as I realized the side of the room completely opposite the window was absolutely drenched.

As far as the most significant weather event I've experienced, that's certainly the 1991 ice storm that hit Rochester and western NY. I was too young to drive then, and anyway it happened overnight, but I do remember hearing the strange sounds of branches falling constantly through the night, along with flashes from arcing transformers. (I hadn't known what either was until the morning; I vaguely thought the flashes were lightning, and the noise I was too sleepy to think about identifying.)

kkt

Scariest was fog, on I-5 in the Willamette Valley.

Big John

Scariest was a blizzard white-out conditions, US 45 near West Bend WI

corco

I drove I-80 from Laramie to Cheyenne back in December 2010 at about 6 PM and was one of the last cars to get through before they closed the freeway.

That was a scary drive. I had a passenger with me, and don't think I could have made it without her help. Essentially once we got up past Vedauwoo it was about 18 MPH all the way to Cheyenne, with her notifying me when I was getting too close to what appeared to be the edge of the road on the passenger side (or where the snow drifts were getting too high to drive over, the road was already definitely narrowed to about 1.25 lanes). I've never driven in worse visibility- I could see maybe a foot to the right of the car and 8 feet ahead with low beams on. Snow was coming down hard and it was incredibly windy.

We were going to see a Gordon Lightfoot concert, and you don't pass that up. We were going to drive back home to Laramie, but the freeway was obviously closed that night (as was 287 through Fort Collins and 34 through Wheatland), so we had to spend the night in Cheyenne. The next morning we ended up having to go most of the way up to Wheatland and come back down 34, since everything else was closed because there were drifts multiple feet high on I-80 and 287.

I'm a very experienced snow/bad conditions driver and have never been in the ditch, but I'd hazard that at least 33% of the time I do that drive in those conditions, I don't make it without going in the ditch.

We made it for the concert and had a good time, so I have no regrets, but man.

MikeTheActuary

I've been in five tornados and two hurricanes.  While they all had their moments, the actual scariest weather I've been through was "snowtober", the October winter storm that hit New England a few years ago.

I was probably in more danger from the tornados...but spending all night listening to trees breaking from the combined weight of heavy wet snow and leaves that hadn't yet fallen was freaky.

Sure, you get some of that effect during a hurricane, but there's plenty of other noise.  But that snowstorm...it was quiet, except for the groaning, cracking, and thudding of the trees.

Ian

A few days after Halloween last semester, there was a decent sized blizzard that hit Maine. On that day, me and a few buddies had the brilliant idea to drive down to Bangor to get food (about a 20 or so minute drive normally from Orono). Although fortunately we didn't wreck on the way there or back, but it was definitely scary nonetheless, especially coming back driving on I-95. Here's a photo I was able to take on my phone waiting to turn onto the I-95 northbound ramp from Hogan Road (exit 187) on that day.

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1995hoo

Probably Hurricane Fran in 1996. I've been through other hurricanes, but Fran sticks in memory. I was attending Duke Law at the time. Some of us were out at a pub when the storm hit. Driving home, probably not totally sober, was interesting since Durham County had taken down all the span-wire traffic lights. Got home and found only one parking space open, underneath a willow tree right outside my apartment. So I left and went to a different lot half a mile away with no trees, power lines, utility poles, etc. nearby. Walked home and found the guy two apartments away had just parked underneath the tree. He told me how stupid I was for not parking there. I said I didn't want a tree falling on my car, to which he told me I was stupid because a willow wouldn't fall over.

Next morning, 95% of Durham had no power (I never lost power thanks to Duke's backup generators). The willow tree had fallen over and destroyed that guy's car. I never said anything to him. Didn't see any reason to do so.
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xcellntbuy

Hurricane Wilma, when I lived in south Florida.

vdeane

The notable ones for me are a freak rainstorm that I encountered once on the Thruway where it was raining so hard that I actually pulled over for a few minutes, a blizzard on I-81 where I passed SEVERAL multi-car pileups (and even had to pull off to let an ambulance pass at one point).

I also drove in this once, and this was on a recreational roadtrip:

Crazy?  Well, that was back when I had my snow tires, and to be fair, the majority of the trip wasn't remotely like that, just a small strip along Lake Ontario.  Just a mile inland and conditions were drastically different.
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KEVIN_224

#12
Memorial Day weekend of 1995. Me and my brother were passengers on a NJ Transit train between Trenton and New York City. We had been in Philadelphia before that. KYW-AM 1060 had mentioned gusty thunderstorms or something like that. The EAS tones went off for the station I was listening to, mentioning the severe thunderstorm warning. I think the power flickered a couple of times on the train we were on. The sky had that sick pea green-gray color to it. Not fun! :(

Brushed by Hurricane Irene passing by my immediate west in August of 2011.

I was one of the few homes which didn't lose power during the freak pre-Halloween snow storm in October of 2011.

Central Connecticut was on the fringe of Hurricane Sandy, yet that evening was HORRIBLE! The lights must've dipped at least 5 times in about a 25 minute span. My brother somehow walked home from work that night. WOW!  :-o

Takumi

Hurricane Isabel in 2003. I was staying at my friend's house at the edge of a forest, and some time at night we heard a thump. We looked outside and a tree had uprooted and fallen inches from the house. At daybreak we ventured out and saw lots more trees that had fallen over. I think by the time it reached us it had weakened to a tropical storm, but the combination of the wind and rain (after a very wet summer) caused the damage to be extensive.

Irene in 2011 wasn't that bad, although a tree falling on a power line down the street from my house had my street without power for over a week. My dog, a year old at the time, was going stir-crazy from being in the house the whole day, however.
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Thing 342

The worst while driving would probably have to be the squall line that I passed through while on I-64 WB that somehow managed to dump six inches of rain in two hours when it reached my house.
Alternatively, it could also be the time when I traveled from Cheyenne to Denver to visit the Zoo (I was about 6), and encountered one of Denver's notorious April snowstorms, accompanied by a large temperature drop.

As for weather experienced overall, probably Isabel in 2003. We lost power for over a week, and many other houses had large portions of their sidings ripped off.


berberry

That's easy, the Candlestick Park Tornado of 1966. I was just a kid, but I was in the building and I still remember it to the point that I sometimes have nightmares about it. It was an F-5 and killed dozens of people all around me. My mother was injured badly, but we all recovered completely.

I have never been through anything nearly that horrible since.

JakeFromNewEngland

The two worst storms I've been through are probably Blizzard Nemo and Hurricane Sandy. Blizzard Nemo dropped almost 4 feet of snow in Milford and we were basically snowed in for a few days. Hurricane Sandy was horrible for us since we live in a mostly wooded area so there were several trees in our yard that fell down and because of that we lost power. We were out of power for almost a week.

CNGL-Leudimin

Quote from: Zeffy on May 16, 2015, 06:47:59 PM
The worst was when I was caught in the middle of a hurricane back down in Florida in 1998 (1997?). I don't remember which one it was, but my family and I were in Miami, and we tried to get out of our hotel we were staying at by taking the elevator. Then the elevator died.

Could it be hurricane Georges? It was mid-to-late September, but it is the only hurricane to hit the area in that time.

As for me, the worst I've been through was a hailstorm while out.
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cpzilliacus

Worst, scariest thunderstorms I have ever experienced were on I-95 in Florida (between Fort Pierce and Jacksonville) and on Highway E18 in southern Finland.  The one in Florida because of the amazingly torrential downpours, the one in Finland because of a massive lightning show.

I have driven through a few hurricanes that have made landfall in Maryland (most recently Hurricane Irene in 2011), but they were not as scary as the thunderstorms above.

I've driven in the Midwestern states of the U.S. some, but have never encountered a severe thunderstorm or tornado ... so far ... there.

Have driven in some pretty heavy snowstorms, but never had a problem with those - just took it slow and keep out of the way of the kooks that thing they can stop their 4x4 vehicles as if the pavement was dry and bare.
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triplemultiplex

July of 2010, this huge rainstorm parked itself over Milwaukee and just flooded the shit out of everything.  I think it dropped 8 inches of water in under an hour.
Second highest discharge ever recorded on the Milwaukee River.

(looking south from North Ave)

Snow, even a lot of snow is usually a non-event for me.  And so far I've managed to avoid the worst of any wind-related fury of nature.
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thenetwork

May, 2000:

I-10 West just west of San Antonio.  I have never seen it rain so hard in my life!  I guess everything is bigger in TX!

Scott5114

A number or tornadic storms have affected Norman while I've been here, and I've taken shelter around a dozen times, but the actual vortex has never been closer than a few miles.

On May 6 we had an extremely severe storm that pelted us with pretty big hail. (I have a photo I'll upload when I get a chance). There was a tornado that hit the west side of Norman during the same event, but hail was the worst we got on the east side.
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jakeroot

Worst weather I've ever experienced, in the rather tame northwest, was an ice storm in January 2012, the most recent ice storm since 1996.

Started with about 8-16 inches of snow, depending on your locale, and then was followed with a couple days of freezing rain. The snow was a lot for us (I screencapped the Weather Channel before the storm -- see below) but the ice really screwed everything up.





Scott5114

Quote from: Scott5114 on May 17, 2015, 10:18:25 PM
A number or tornadic storms have affected Norman while I've been here, and I've taken shelter around a dozen times, but the actual vortex has never been closer than a few miles.

On May 6 we had an extremely severe storm that pelted us with pretty big hail. (I have a photo I'll upload when I get a chance). There was a tornado that hit the west side of Norman during the same event, but hail was the worst we got on the east side.

uncontrollable freak sardine salad chef



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