Chestnuts in Arborland: We're Not In Kansas California Anymore

Thursday, March 15 started out as a pretty normal day, though we woke up to the first truly humid day of the season: 85% humidity. Ew. It was also pretty warm, in the high 70's, but that seemed to have become the pattern over the last few days.

Calm before the storm and a robin.

The forecast had predicted a possibility (about a 40% chance) of thunderstorms later in the afternoon, but we've had those before and it didn't seem like anything to worry about. I'd been checking Weather Underground for updates (because you know how I like a good storm), when I suddenly saw that we had a Tornado Watch. We've also had a couple of those before and all it means is that conditions are possibly favorable for a tornado to form. In the past, all of these watches have just expired and nothing happened.

I turned on the news anyway around 5:00pm, but they were just discussing regular, boring news things. That changed when all programing (on every channel) was interrupted by the National Weather Service Alert System telling us that one of the nearby counties had gone from a Severe Thunderstorm Warning to a Tornado Warning. A Tornado Warning is the next step up from a Tornado Watch and means that a tornado is now likely to form. This is about when you run for your safe place.

When the news resumed it was all weather, all the time. I watched as the thunderstorm grew more and more intense with dark red and purple on the forecast maps. Then they told us that huge hail was forming right in the middle of the storm and that was where they expected spinning to start happening. Since our winter had been so short and we no longer have any snow on the ground, the warm air we've been having never cooled down. When a cold cell moved in from the north, it crashed with our warm air and created this crazy storm. The interesting thing is that the storm was not actually that big, just small pockets of fury, but it was moving towards us.

Once the Tornado Warning was in place, the news played continuously, no commercials or anything. The National Weather Service interrupted again, but this time they said that the counties affected by the warning included Washtenaw. (I took this photo after danger to our county had passed, so just imagine it says "Washtenaw.") The warning began around 5:15.

At this time, Jacob was still at school and I was home with the cat. We'd been communicating via email and I knew that Jake was in a safe place — his cube is practically in the basement and there are no windows. The cat and I, on the other hand, were not so safe since our apartment is on the top floor and all we have for a safe place is a tiny hall closet at the bottom of the stairs.

I wasn't too alarmed yet because the Tornado Warning was in effect only for northern Washtenaw county and we live in the middle. However, the rain had started and we'd been having a lot of lightening and rolling thunder. Our neighbors and friends across the way, Freddy and Veronika, have a basement, so I called Veronika and asked if we could come over if we needed too. She was more than happy to help. I kept one ear to the news and started gathering our most important items and dug out the cat carrier.

When I next checked Weather Underground I saw this:

That's kind of a lot of scary.

The National Weather Service flashed again and this time the warning had moved out of Livingston county (to our north), and was completely in Washtenaw county. The news showed that the storm was making a bee-line for Ann Arbor.

When the tornado sirens went off, I grabbed my back pack, stuffed the cat into the carrier, and ran over to Veronika's. This was around 5:45pm. The sirens stopped and did not go again, but the birds had also gone quiet and the sky was getting darker and darker. There was more impressive thunder and lightening and then: hail.

It started small and just got bigger and bigger—I was glad our car was in the garage. I tried to take some pictures, but the rain was blowing and the hail was bouncing, which hurts! Here are my best shots, I have never seen hail so big.

Do you see that enormous piece? It's about the size of a golf ball.

A piece bounced towards me, it was one of the smaller ones, but still pretty big.

Though the sky got very dark (it was only around 6pm in these pictures, but it looks like midnight), and the storm/hail was severe, we were very lucky to have the tornado pass us without touching down.

Hail, not snow.

The Tornado Warning was extended from 6:30 until 7:15, but after that the cat and I returned home. This is what we saw when we got outside:

Again, hail, not snow.

Swimming pool in the backyard from the heavy rain.

Our balcony had collected a fair amount of hail as well.

I waited until the storm had passed, around 7:45, and then went to pick up Jake. Along the way, I listened to the radio and heard that a tornado, or possibly two, had touched down in Dexter, a town just to the northwest of Ann Arbor. When I say "just," I mean, less than 10 miles from the center of Ann Arbor.

www.maps.google.com

When we were home again we watched the news and saw pictures of the destruction in Dexter. Many houses were completely destroyed and trees were gone. It was definitely less severe than the pictures we've seen out of Indiana, for example, these past few weeks, but still very scary.

Friday was a lovely day, again, but the news stories were pretty depressing. It seems that the tornado that ripped through Dexter was a category F3 with winds between about 150-200 mph. And this storm also produced two more tornadoes: one further north of us, and one to the southeast (so, along the path the storm took right through Ann Arbor).

I'd been told that tornadoes are not at all common in southeast Michigan, and that Ann Arbor really isn't hit at all because we are in a valley. I'm not sure if Dexter is also in this valley, but I am extremely grateful that we weren't hit. It seems that this was extremely unusual weather; of the past five tornadoes in southeast Michigan, three hit on 3/15/12, one hit on 3/12/12, and the last one was in 1986. I really hope this doesn't predict the rest of our spring.

One "funny" story that came out of all this, someone found a ruby slipper amid the rubble of their house in Dexter. Seriously. They've requested that Dorothy come and pick it up.