Tornado

We have been without power for over 24 hours as I write this on Wednesday evening. To back up, on Tuesday evening Bob and I were getting ready to drive into Deptford for "Indoctrination" at the Elks lodge, when our phones all started sending us alerts. First they were fore severe thunderstorms, then for flooding, and within a few minutes the alerts were for tornado warnings. We take tornado warnings very seriously because a motorhome is not built to withstand the force of a tornado.  Bob and I jogged on over to daughter Kristen's house in time to help her close windows and reassure the boys that everything was going to be fine.

We all watched the skies darken and the winds begin to blow like a son of a gun. A large tree limb fell with a crash onto the lawn chairs where we had been sitting a few minutes before. Lightening snaked across the sky and rain poured down. Within minutes the winds eased up. 

Looking at the time Bob and I figured we had enough time to get to the meeting if we hustled, and since the storm looked like it had moved on we headed off to Deptford. 

We had to dodge downed tree limbs as we drove, but got to the beginning of the street where the Lodge is located when we were stopped by a police car barricading the road. Twice more we hit police barricades before we made it to the Lodge. Surprisingly we were on time but had to wait for others who also had difficulty navigating the local roads. We later heard that a tornado had indeed touched down in the area, destroying a home. Cars were also flipped over. Scary!  We were indoctrinated, I paid my dues, and am ready to be initiated at the meeting next week.

On the way out of the meeting at about 8:30 we saw that the rain had stopped and the sky was an eerie bright yellow. Very odd.

Kristen told me the power went out right after we left for the meeting, and cell phone connection was lost as well.  Fortunately, because of our "house battery" and generator, we have been able to keep our fridge running and we were able to run our fan last night for a comfortable night sleep. Ours were the only lights in the neighborhood last night.

This morning we all worked to cut up the downed limb, and moved all the branches out to the side of the road. 

Then Bob and I emptied the little pond in the backyard that had been filling with rotting leaves for a long time. It was a backbreaking job and took hours, but we got buckets of slimy, decaying leaves, all the rocks (and there were a LOT of rocks!) and all but the last couple of inches of watery mud out. When we have power again we'll use the shop vac to get the rest.

Granddaughters Quinn and Eve came over to play, and daughter Catherine brought Jillian. Only Emily, who lives north of here, had power at home. We ended up taking a ride to my daughter in law's house a half hour south of us to make sure she was ok, as phones were still not working. She was fine, and came back with us to spend some time with Emily and her air conditioned house. 

We went to bed with windows open and fingers crossed that the power would come on soon. 

Update: In the middle of the night, it did.  Yay!