OBIO
April 10th, 2013, 20:04
You just have to love springtime in Ohio. At 5:10 AM, I was sitting on my front porch wearing shorts, a t-shirt and sneakers, smoking a cigarette and basking in a nice warmish spring morning. At 11:30 AM, while taking the trash hopper out to empty into the compactor (part of my new job responsibility at work.....the supervisor gave me the position of emptying the produce and trash hoppers.....a position only held by a string of immigrant workers before...I am the first non-Hispanic to have this position in our department), I was battered by an icy cold down pour and lightning. At 4:10 PM, as I was leaving work....I was met by a slight rain, some lightning and a very scary GREEN sky.....for those who don't know, a green sky is a tornado sky. Got into my car, fired it up, put on my seat belt, and began exiting the industrial park. Suddenly the wind kicked up by a factor of a billion, the rain was so heavy and so wind blown that I could not see outside of my car. The wind was so strong that it was lifting the nose of my car a good 3 feet into the air...if the front tires were not lifted off the ground, they came darn close to being lifted off the ground. I knew that my car was about to get flipped nose over butt-hole. In the distance, I could see the bright discharges of electricity as power lines were ripped down. I KNEW that a tornado was heading right at me. I threw the car into reverse, gunned the motor and the car did not move....not until the nose of the car sank back down a bit. I managed to pull up along the front of a building...shielding my self from most of the wind.....but I soon realized that I now had a 50 foot tall brick and stone wall looming over me...and if that wall were to fall.....I would get smushed. So, unable to see more than 3 inches out of my car, I tried to make it back to the building I work in....and to the safety of the tornado shelter. About this time, the hail started. About the size of jelly beans upwards to the size of grapes....the hail beat at my car for a good 15 minutes....along with the very strong wind and insane rain. I missed the intersection to make the turn to my work building and...somehow not hitting the railings and side walls....found my car nosing into a sloping truck loading dock on the side of another building in the park. I pulled down as far as I could go into that loading dock.....thus getting my car away from the wind....but the rain and hail were still insane. I sat there in my car for 20 minutes.....fearing that at any moment the building would be blown over on top of me, that the twister would pick me and my car up and ferry us off to parts unknown.
As quickly as it kicked up....it died down. I made my way home....a drive of less than 2 miles....and saw lots of tree limbs down. Got home to find that I had to power....not surprising given the number of power line discharges I saw flashing through the wind blown rain.
I checked the local news....no mention of a tornado....but I am sure that in the next couple of days some report will either point to a twister or a straight-line gust.
Tim
As quickly as it kicked up....it died down. I made my way home....a drive of less than 2 miles....and saw lots of tree limbs down. Got home to find that I had to power....not surprising given the number of power line discharges I saw flashing through the wind blown rain.
I checked the local news....no mention of a tornado....but I am sure that in the next couple of days some report will either point to a twister or a straight-line gust.
Tim