![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
I spent yesterday driving across four states to visit my best friend. Driving through Illinois was about what you'd expect--everything was under construction and down to one lane. When I finally got to Iowa I was looking forward to some smooth sailing. Ha.
I barely got past Davenport when the skies opened up. It got very dark and was raining so hard that I couldn't see the exits from the right lane. Today I found out that storm spawned sixteen tornadoes, but it only poured while I was in it.
Missouri was just very hot, but then I hit Kansas. The weather alerts on my phone never went off, but somewhere around Lawrence I saw some programmable road signs announcing a high wind warning. There was barely a breeze where I was, but there were some very dark clouds just to the south, so I figured that's where the problem was.
About five minutes later, I came around a curve in the road and there was a long, straight stretch in front of me. I noticed that the visibility on the back half was markedly worse than on the front half. A minute later, the surface of the dirt road next to the highway went blowing down the road. Then a little cloud of debris went sailing over the highway just above car height. Then a gust of wind hit my car so hard that it punched me half out of my lane. Then it happened again. Then the sustained winds hit and everyone slowed to a crawl. The person in front of me turned on their hazard flashers and less than a minute later it was pitch black and raining so hard that the only thing I could see was those hazard lights. I just kept following that person for the longest five minutes of my life until I came out the other side of the rain shaft.
According to the thermometer on my dash, the temperature when I drove into the storm was 100°F. When I came out the other side, it was 71°F. Welcome to the Midwest in summertime.
I barely got past Davenport when the skies opened up. It got very dark and was raining so hard that I couldn't see the exits from the right lane. Today I found out that storm spawned sixteen tornadoes, but it only poured while I was in it.
Missouri was just very hot, but then I hit Kansas. The weather alerts on my phone never went off, but somewhere around Lawrence I saw some programmable road signs announcing a high wind warning. There was barely a breeze where I was, but there were some very dark clouds just to the south, so I figured that's where the problem was.
About five minutes later, I came around a curve in the road and there was a long, straight stretch in front of me. I noticed that the visibility on the back half was markedly worse than on the front half. A minute later, the surface of the dirt road next to the highway went blowing down the road. Then a little cloud of debris went sailing over the highway just above car height. Then a gust of wind hit my car so hard that it punched me half out of my lane. Then it happened again. Then the sustained winds hit and everyone slowed to a crawl. The person in front of me turned on their hazard flashers and less than a minute later it was pitch black and raining so hard that the only thing I could see was those hazard lights. I just kept following that person for the longest five minutes of my life until I came out the other side of the rain shaft.
According to the thermometer on my dash, the temperature when I drove into the storm was 100°F. When I came out the other side, it was 71°F. Welcome to the Midwest in summertime.
no subject
Date: 2018-07-21 03:43 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2018-07-22 03:59 am (UTC)From: