When I leave on one of these road trips I expect a little excitement and maybe even a problem or two along the way..... But a tornado is just a little more than I bargained for!!!!!
So there I was outside doing some work and I get a phone call from my son and he asks if "everything is all right" to which I replied "everything is fine" and then I said what is the problem and he said that a tornado had just landed by his plant and they lost power. Well from there things only got worse. He came home to work since we still had power. We then decided to clean the gutters out that day (at this point you are allowed to say that I am not the SHARPEST KNIFE IN THE DRAWER!!!! so we got out the 24 foot extension ladder and up I went.
Well, wanna guess what happened after that, well even if you don't I am going to tell you..... Yup the wind started picking up and there I am hanging on to the house with one arm and trying to use the hose to flush the gutters with the other arm which trust me ain't the easiest thing to do on a good day, but with gusts up to 40mph it does make things just a little more tense!!!! After a lot of hanging on and more than a little bit of language that cannot be written into this story the gutters were finally clean!!!!!! And then the real excitement came along!!!!! Another tornado hit up in Tennessee which is only about 10 miles from where I am. That story will follow this one..
The time of day was about 8:30PM when it really broke loose. We are all sitting there watching the local station which has preempted all the programming for this WEATHER EVENT!!!!
So there we are when we loose power and you (WELL NOT REALLY YOU) but use your imagination. Just imagine being in a tunnel and your hear a locomotive coming at you!!!!!! Yes folks what they say about these monsters is for real!!!!! Just give me a good old fashioned hurricane any day of the week!!!!!! at least you know where it is and what the wind speed is.. One of the last things we saw on the TV before losing power was 100mph winds in Athens, TN.
So the next morning we get up after finally going to bed some time around midnight when it calmed down... Schools have been cancelled, my daughter-in-law cannot get to work, my son finally decides to try and get to work and has to go all the back roads as the entrances and exits to Ringgold, Ga. are closed!!!! The biggest tornado of them all had a DIRECT HIT on Ringgold, Ga. and quite literally pretty much wiped out the town!!!! As of April 30 which is the day I am writing this we are still not able to get on I-75 and are still using the back roads to get around. I am trying to figure out when I will be able to leave and head west which at this time looks like about Tuesday evening May 3rd or Wednesday morning May 4th??
The attached pictures really do not tell the story here, but that is all there is. The statistics at this point in time for Ringgold are that the tornado hit on April 27th and was a category F-4 with winds of 190 mph!!!!!!!
