A Flyover Blog

Out My Front Door

 

Mitch went outside this morning and snapped a couple of pictures. Beautiful, isn't it? There's about 3 inches of snow on top of 4 inches of sleet and ice on that driveway. No, I'm not shoveling it. It's stuck to the concrete like mortar. Schools are still closed tomorrow but traffic was beginning to move around town today - on the main roads anyway.

   

This is the tiny park on the other side of Lone Pine. It's one big ice rink over there. We fared much better than our neighbors to the south. They got devastating ice. I heard from my friend, Mary a few miles west of town. They were without power for 2 days but now have lights and heat. Let's hope this is the last blast of winter this year. Fingers crossed...

White Out

 

Here's the update: We've had sleet and ice here in our little corner of Springfield since yesterday afternoon. We are extremely grateful that it wasn't all freezing rain. Branson and points south are still being hammered with freezing rain tonight. There are thousands of people without power there, but so far, our little house in Tiny Tourist Town still has juice. 

The cottage here in Springfield is cozy warm and we have a fireplace, which I very much appreciate on a cold snowy night. Yes, it's snowing now. Hard; started about 20 minutes ago. It's supposed to snow all night. Schools are closed, of course, and traffic on Lone Pine is practically non-existent. Mitch and I both have offices upstairs, so our work continues no matter the weather.

Temps won't climb above freezing until Saturday, so it looks like a messy week ahead. Hope you are toasty warm and ice free at your house!

Weather Radar: KY3.com.

This Is Not The Way To Start A Week

 

Three years in a row?  Gee, I hope the weather dudes are wrong about this one. Mitch and I picked up grocercies for his mom today, checked our supply of bird seed and ice melt, and ran a few errands. At this moment, the worst of the storm is expected to skirt south of town. Tiny tourist town - and our little house - are smack in the middle of an Ice Storm Warning, with significant power outages expected.

Greene County Emergency Management met today to get their storm plan in place. This is the first time I've actually lived in town during a winter storm; we've spent the last 19 years in the country. Oh, we had neighbors, but we were most definitely on our own. Living on a busy city street during a weather event will be a new experience. This whole mess is supposed to be over sometime Wednesday. I'll keep you posted... and I hope this storm isn't paying you a visit.

Weather map courtesy of KY3.com.

Farewell Summer

I know, there's still an entire week of Summer left on the calendar before Autumn officially begins, but I wore a sweatshirt today. I did. Ike rolled through SW MO during the night dumping torrential rains, then that storm was herded east by a very strong cold front. Consequently, it was 65 degrees today with 30 mph wind gusts.

Our low tonight will be in the upper 40's, so I grabbed the camera and went outside to snap a few pictures around the yard before Fall really does arrive and freezes these blooms.  These poor flowers really took a beating during the storm, but they still smiled for the camera. That's Bells of Ireland on top and White Rose Lisianthus blooms. I love these dainty flowers!

This is the sidewalk in front of our house. See the bench down there? That's the bus stop; the #5 St. Louis stops there 9 times a day, 6 days a week. I love it. You can see a lot of debris and leaves littering the grass. The leaves from our catalpa tree are the size of dinner plates!

Mitch helped me with the 3 planters along the fence. They're huge and more than my weak left arm can handle. I love these pots. They're so cheery. This is the second time we planted them this summer; Japanese beetles invaded the first planting. They devoured the ornamental sweet potato, white petunias and Maui Star Flower in about a week. The spray I used to get rid of then worked; it killed the plants in a single day and the Japanese beetles left. Not exactly what I planned, but I think the new plants look great, too.

We put a big Sun Fern in the middle pot. It's thriving. I have absolutely no room for these plants indoors this winter and I don't really have a green thumb. I hate to see the frost kill them, so I may have to find them good homes!

One For the Record Books

Friday night, Tiny Tourist Town - where Mitch and I lived until six weeks ago - was swamped by 5.71 inches of rain. Springfield, our new hometown got about 3 inches. The flooding is rampant. Again. And an old record was shattered. June 2008 holds the distinction of being the wettest June on record. Ever. I haven't heard from my friend, Lois, yet. She had some water woes earlier this month. The flood waters washed away some roads and closed many many others including all four lanes of I-44. An emergency shelter is open in Tiny Tourist Town for victims of the flood. Let's hope July brings sunny skies and a break from all this dangerous water.

Photo courtesy of marsradio.

Flash Flood

Yesterday, we had a good old-fashioned monsoon. Seriously. Springfield saw anywhere from 3.9 to 6.5 inches of rain yesterday - depending on what part of town you were in - and it all happened in 5 hours. Caused mayhem aplenty, including 35 water rescues in town. Thought I'd share a few photos of the flash flooding with you; these were taken by photographers with the Springfield News-Leader. You can click here to see more.

This is Sequiota Park, where I walk regularly. That walkway spans a huge creekbed which is usually dry as a bone.

This is a business across the road from the park.

This was taken at another park nearby.

This is a usually busy intersection downtown. What a mess.

The Water Rescue Crews responded to more calls yesterday than they usually get in an entire year. Thankfully, there were no fatalities. Mitch and I are fine; our little house stayed dry and snug. We've been put on notice that the coming week could bring another round or two of torrential rain. I hope they're wrong.

Water Water Everywhere

I thought I'd show you a few pictures of the flooding in town last week. Our little house is snug and dry, but this event caused traffic nightmares everywhere. Some of you might have vacationed here before, so you know what the shoreline normally looks like.

This is a shot of The Landing and City Campground - which are both mostly under water. The bridge (which I cross daily) was closed for half a day when a large boat dock broke loose, floated down river and nearly collided with the concrete pillars. The floating restaurant was closed for several days. The walkway leading to it was submerged.

Here onlookers watch as the current carries Scotty's Dock down river. They eventually did stop the dock, by anchoring 22 concrete blocks to it - each one weighed 2 tons.

This is a shot of The Fire and Fountain show at The Landing - all submerged under flood waters. A six foot sea wall was supposed to prevent this from ever happening. Back to the drawing board.

Another shot of The Landing. Those shops aren't supposed to be on the water's edge. Normally, there is a sea wall, sidewalk, outdoor seating and stage  separating the shops and the lake.

This is a shot of Table Rock Dam. Table Rock crested last Saturday, one foot above it's maximum capacity, which was an all-time high. Witnesses said water actually came over the top of the dam - that's in addition to all that water pouring through those spill gates.

Literally hundreds of homes were damaged by floodwaters on the 4 lakes that make up the White River Basin, many of them beyond repair. We hope we never see a repeat of record rains that March brought us.

These pictures and more can be seen at The Springfield News Leader.

Stormy Weather

We had another round of heavy rain yesterday. It's clear today, but we're in for severe weather tonight and all day tomorrow. So, before the next siege begins, I thought I'd show you a few pics of the area.

Cloud bank. We've seen a lot of these lately. This photo by MikenJoe.

Mitch got this shot a few days ago at Table Rock Dam. Those flood gates have been open now for more than 2 weeks and the lake level is still dangerously high.

This is Powersite Dam, 20-some miles down stream from Table Rock Dam. Water from Taneycomo is spilling over the top of the dam here; usually these 2 bodies of water are separated by a 50 foot drop. This pic by Branson1.

That's not snow on the road here. It's hail. Chrissy75 got this shot while driving down the road a few days ago.

We've seen a few of these, too the past few weeks. Louieanne got a shot of this monster.

We hope that, after this next round, we finally get some bright blue skies. Thanks to Reaenat for this gorgeous sky. I hope you're having a peaceful Spring where you live.

Drying Out

We did not float away. We are high and dry here, but we had the good sense to build a house on top of the peninsula, not lakeside. Those folks down on the water aren't faring so well. Monday was a wild day with flash flooding and a few small tornados which tossed a school bus off the road and caused the usual spotty destruction and mayhem. The real mayhem however came last night. Mitch was unable to reach his mom (40 miles away) and got worried when a tornado warning was issued for her town. He phoned Vickie, who lives a few miles away. She went over - in the storm, sirens going off - to check on her. Sure enough, my MIL had fallen and wasn't able to get on her feet. She had her place deadbolted so Vic had to call the fire department to break in. Mitch drove up - in the midst of a tornado warning, mind you - while I got all her paperwork together for a hospital admission. Oh yeah, adrenelin in overdrive here. Turns out, MIL is fine. She decided to quit taking her blood pressure medicine a few days ago, stop eating and hit the quick fix diet drugs - the industrial strength stuff that dehydrates you and spikes your bp. Mitch & Vic found 4 jars of it stashed in her apartment. It left her too weak to stand but the paramedics checked her over and couldn't find a thing wrong. They fed her, gave her her bp meds and a stern lecture. Needless to say, I'd like to kick her into next Tuesday. So that was my Monday. How was yours?

I found this great photo on Bella Magazine.

Time To Build an Ark

I know, water is not supposed to cover the earth ever again. However, its been raining here since Friday night. This follows the foot of rain we got two weeks ago. The ground is saturated - like a big soppy sponge. As I sit here writing this post, I have one eye glued to the TV because the 6 counties just west of us are under tornado warnings. That's warning not watch - and it's headed our way. You know, we've had a string of "Bad Weather Mondays" since mid-January. This is the 3rd time we've had tornado outbreaks to start the week. I'm beginning to feel like we're in some sort of Time Warp Loop Thingie. (I know there's a technical Star Trekkie term for that phenomenon, but I don't know it.) Just thought I'd touch base in case we all float away later today. So, is it dry where you are?

Photo by Anthony.