Earthquake and Storms

[Sorry no pictures today.  Blogger has been rejecting pictures on THIS blog, but not my other.  Can't figure out why.  I'm not exceeding any limits.]

Well it sure has been an interesting few weeks.  First an earthquake on Aug 23rd, then Hurricane Irene Aug 27th/28th, and then Tropical Storm Lee Sept 5th-9th!

It was the 1st earthquake I ever felt, and while it was nothing like West Coast earthquakes, it was certainly more of a surprise.  My first thought was "It CAN'T be an earthquake, they don't happen here!", but after a few seconds, it was obvious it wasn't a tree falling on the house.  And then we had to wait to see if there would be aftershocks.

Hurricanes aren't terribly common here.  They tend to either make landfall south and approach over land, weakening rapidly, or pass by further off the coast.  But we do get serious ones occasionally.  I remember Hurricane Agnes in 1972.  It came right up the Chesapeake Bay and sank the family boat (a complete loss).  Then there was Hurricane Floyd in 1999.  That one dropped so much rain so fast that my street was flooded, half my front yard was flooded, and I stayed up all night wet-vacuuming water from the basement.  It is the only time I've ever seen the 2 storm drains next to my yard actually completely covered with standing water!

So then we had Irene.  Fortunately, the ground was very dry and basically absorbed all the rainfall and there wasn't even standing water afterwards on my low front lawn.  Still, 7" fell here, and it was the strongest wind I have experienced in my 25 years at this location.

Tropical Storm Lee was actually worse.  First, it came over Maryland and just sat there for 4 days raining almost constantly!  Not as hard as Irene, but for over twice as long.  Second, the rain bands were heading directly north the last 2 days.  The strongest ones kept going directly through my county.  It was depressing, as if the rain bands were following the highway through town!  I had to empty my good rain gauge twice!  The total for Lee here was 10.5"!  The airport 15 miles west only got 5.5" and to the east they got only 7".  That made 17.5" of rain in 13 days...  Third, the ground was completely saturated from Irene, so the rainfall had nowhere to go but across the surface seeking low spots.

One of those low spots was my patio!  The entire yard slopes gradually from the far back to the street front.  Part of the patio has cinder block walls to hold the slope.  The non-cinder block entrance is at ground level.  The patio was never built properly.  The house builder didn't properly slope it slightly toward the lawn to prevent water collecting there.  And over the years, the lawn has risen slightly, enough so that prolonged rain can lap against the sliding glass basement doors and seep in.  I have occasionally had a slight problem with that.

Well, after the 3rd day of rain, it finally started seeping in again.  I tried the wet-vac, but it was too prolonged a rain to stop seeping in.  I finally had to go out in the pouring rain at Midnight and dig a 6" deep and wide ditch 10' to a more downslope spot at the fence gate.  Happily, the water collected in the patio started rushing out!  I was relieved.  In only 10 minutes, the collected rainfall was a foot away from the doors and I knew I wouldn't have any further problems in the basement.

It finally stopped raining very early this morning...

One odd note about the storm.  The County came by just before Hurricane Irene and cleaned the collected debris of several years from the primary storm drain.  It worked fine for Irene.  But Lee covered it back up again.  That shows how much more forceful rainfall drainage there was from Lee.  And not only tree debris; there are golfball size stones covering the woven tree debris covering the storm drain!  AND, it appears that the brick storm drain has been broken by the force of the debris and stones.  The back bricks appear all loose and tilted, and the metal grate at an angle.  I will have to call the County about that.  I'm sure they will be thrilled!

Can I please have a break from earthquakes and hurricanes for a while?  Please?

Hurricane Irene

Well, it's been an interesting week.  First an earthquake, then a hurricane!  Hurricanes aren't too rare here, but this was the most direct hit I've experienced as an adult (and the eye was still 80 miles east).  But it was clear there was going to be major rain and wind.

So I was prepared the evening before.  Aside from the usual emergency supplies (flashlights, crank radio, batteries, water, food, etc), I made sure to have a good supply of comfort foods...

Before I went to bed that evening, I noticed my 5" rain gauge was at 4.75", so I went out and emptied it.  I took a quick look around the yard for any tree damage and found none.  But the most intense part of the storm hadn't arrived yet.  The lights dimmed a couple of times, but I never lost power.  I'm very glad all the electric and cable lines are underground here!

This morning I found another 2.5" of rain in the gauge, for a total of 7.25".

There was some tree damage, but nothing serious.  I haven't driven out yet, but I did hear a chain saw in the neighborhood, so someone had some larger damage.

I found some medium branches fallen.

And a few smaller ones, but those were from my favorite saucer magnolia tree.

I have some repair work to do in that tree!  There are a couple of breaks like this.

Two of my tomato cages blew over in spite of being staked.  One stake was bent over at ground level, the other was simply pushed over in the soaked garden soil.  I was able to raise the cages without any apparent damage to the plants.  I put 2 stakes on each cage for better protection.

So I came through the hurricane in good shape.