What's the worst weather you've ever experienced?

[Kaoskadosk]

The worst I've had was last winter, with about 60-70cm snow in certain areas, but other than that, weather in Sweden is veeeery mild.  :dontknow: Floods and stuff do happen in the lowlands of southern Sweden, but never in Stockholm, where I live.

 

[stubhead]

I was living in Coconut Grove when Hurricane Andrew passed overhead. And I do mean overhead - being in the eye of a category 5 hurricane is something everybody should do - once. :hello2: I was living in what's called a "cracker house", built in the 1930's out of hard Florida pine - my house was OK, but the newer houses further south turned into matchsticks. There were trees down everywhere, boats all over the place - it's quite surreal to see a 70-foot cabin cruiser sitting in the middle of the road, a mile from the bay. The restaurant I was working at then was right on the bay, and the front wall blew in and the kitchen was filled about three feet high with weird weedy shit from the bottom of the bay, which was home to some seriously nasty-looking little buggy/fishy creatures, flipping around and dying. Ick. We didn't have power for nine days (MONTHS further south), but the water was contaminated for a month. Take a shower, get pinkeye, drink it, get dysentery. The leading edge of a hurricane is more dangerous for some reason, 200 mph winds, and while the hurricane was blowing overhead I distinctly remember thinking that it was alive - and not a good alive, either. 

Things like food and drink (and TAKING A SHOWER) take on a bigger importance when you're not sure there will be any, but the single weirdest thing was the wood ticks - it must have been breeding season in the Everglades or something, because about a week after the hurricane billions and billions of the little buggers just sprang up and began looking for food. You'd look down at the sidewalk, and on one 2' by 2' concrete square there'd be a few hundred ticks - so don't go in the bushes. Hundred or thousands of pets took off during the storm, and they largely died from the ticks (and fleas). The University of Miami had an AIDS research lab down in South Miami with a bunch of infected monkeys - who escaped, and got hungry of course. So eventually, the National Guard was blowing infected orangutans and baboons out of the trees with M-16's, because the monkeys were trying to eat people's dogs and getting really aggressive with people.
Like I said, everybody should try it once! Just once....  :blob7:

 

[Cagey]

Damn. I think I'll be ok if I go my whole life without ever experiencing that.

 

[pabloman]

Ya, It's a very strange sensation. The hurricane hits and then everything kind of calms down, and the sun shines and then all of a sudden the shit hits the fan, ALL OVER AGAIN.

 

[Paul-less]

First thing I did when we got power... MAKE COFFEE!~

GIVE 'ER!

but seriously, I agree.

 

[ptirman]

You know the 9th worst tornado in American history occurred in Michigan near Flint so it does happen.

I grew up in Arkansas where every single year I would wake up sometime during the night with sirens blasting and get under a mattress and crack open some windows. In high school an announcement was made over the loudspeaker one day in the late seventies where everyone ran outside and we watched a tornado completely decimate the neighboring town of Cabot.
Then I moved to Galveston and lived through 2 hurricanes and a tropical storm. And when it wasn't storming it was so freakin hot and humid that I would say that that was the worst weather.

The west is so different, just not comparable.

 

[stormbringer]

Hurricane Ivan... It shredded the area around me and being a total newbie to the area, I was totally unprepared. My friends all thought I was crazy because I didn't evacuate, but in all honesty, I really had no where to go. So I bought 2 cases of beer, moved all my guitars and stuff to the most secure place in the house, along with a recliner (it happened to be where the W/D would have been), and listened to the spooky music being made by the pipes (since there was no W/D - it had an eerie howl all night). The gulf came within about 100 yards of my house through the night and other than my roof tiles being stripped off my house, I made it through much better than a lot of people around me. No one in my neighborhood stayed and when dawn was barely breaking through I ventured out for a peek. It was pretty surreal... I did video occasionally during the night and some of the weirdest scenes are when the air looks like foam because it was whipping the water up so aggresively. Once the power was out and I had lost contact with all my friends in Washington State (whom I was chatting with online) I felt very isolated. And although the storm was pretty wicked, the ensuing 1-2 weeks without power sucked way more. Been extremely lucky since my wife and I have moved back along the Gulf (fingers crossed) and really haven't had a lot of issues...

 

[elfro89]

I feel lucky i live in scotland when it comes to weather, Sure its not the warmest place but the climate here just isnt the one for tropical storms or tornado's, any we do get are weak and just freak accidents. I personally have never seen one touch the ground. seen one in the making at around 2000ft but it never made it. thats the only time i can think of in regards to that. Thunderstorms are rare here, we get maybe 1 minor one every year. flooding... hardly any at all. Snow, some times its thick but not exactly artic weather. this year i beleive it got about -15C to -20C which is the coldest i remember it being in a long long time. We do get far too much cloud, rain, drizzle and wind, not strong winds but enough to piss you off on your travels.(the odd truck blown over or the odd crosswind on the motorways.

I think heat stroke in the summer kills more people aswell as freezing to death in the winter, this is generally restricted to older people. I can't remember a time when someone died during severe weather, other then last year when a police officer died when a bridge got sweapped away by a flood.

 

[Lucky #7]

Tropical Storm Allison was pretty bad here in Houston just because of the flooding, but Ike two years ago was absurd.  I got to do five days at my parents house with no power, a three week old, a two year old, and a wife still healing up from a C-Section.  Funny thing was our power out closer to the coast was back on two weeks before my parents came back.  I didn't venture out to look at it much as it mostly came through at night and didn't really hit until 2 AM or so and everybody else was asleep.  That said, my parents live in a neighborhood that built out in the 50s so the trees are large.  Watching the wind slam around gigantic oak trees and pine trees like they were nothing was a trip.  I also saw the transformer blow that took out the power.  That was freaking nuts.

All in all, the worst thing was dealing with the two kids and a hormonal wife that doesn't much care for my mom in Texas summer heat with no power.  That was a b****.

 

[Cagey]

The power thing really is a hardship. Cleaning up, rebuilding, etc. is no fun, but no power? It's worse than living in the woods.

 

[mayfly]

The power thing really is a hardship. Cleaning up, rebuilding, etc. is no fun, but no power? It's worse than living in the woods.

I also lived through the big Ice storm in ottawa about 10 years ago.  Didn't have power for a week or so.  It was fun though - it was in the middle of winter and we just cozied up to the fireplace.  Fortunately we had a gas hot water heater - so we could have hot showers  :headbang:

 

[Mor Paul]

The power thing really is a hardship. Cleaning up, rebuilding, etc. is no fun, but no power? It's worse than living in the woods.

I also lived through the big Ice storm in ottawa about 10 years ago.  Didn't have power for a week or so.  It was fun though - it was in the middle of winter and we just cozied up to the fireplace.  Fortunately we had a gas hot water heater - so we could have hot showers  :headbang:

Heater? In an igloo? YOU FOOL!

 

[Cagey]

I also lived through the big Ice storm in ottawa about 10 years ago.  Didn't have power for a week or so.  It was fun though - it was in the middle of winter and we just cozied up to the fireplace.  Fortunately we had a gas hot water heater - so we could have hot showers  :headbang:

We've got gas for the water, furnace and stove, so that much is covered. But, it gets awfully boring without power.

 

[B3Guy]

The worst weather I have really LIVED through was this summer here in MN. I was working in Blaine, left work . . . big thunderstorm, sirens, so I turned on the radio: "Tornado in Anoka, headed for Blaine". Three minutes later, as I get onto Freeway 35 going north: "New tornado touchdown in Blaine headed North". As I drive 55 on the interstate (extremely low visibility in the wind and downpour) I am now between Forest Lake and Wyoming: "Tornado touchdown on Forest Lake". ONce off the freeway, I crawled at about 20mph because I couldn't see a thing . . . almost got washed off the road a couple of times by the wind. Got home safe, but MAN! it had me sweating!

 

[CrackedPepper]

For me, it was the Blizzard of '77 in Buffalo, NY preceeded by the Icestorm of '76. 

The blizzard was astounding - there used to be a raised section of highway along the Lake Erie waterfront called the Skyway.  They had to make rope trains to get stranded motorists off the Skyway because you literally could not see anything as the snow was so heavy. 

[source]

You can see the last section of the Skyway adjacent to the large building in the lower portion of the photo.

In '76, we had an ice storm where the ice was so thick, kids were ice skating in the streets.  I spent the day bailing water in our sump pump.

[source]

 

[pabloman]

I'm not trying to be racist or any thing but have you ever seen anyone other than a white guy drive a scout? Please know I have several cars including a 68 buick lesabre with wire wheels and a chain steering wheel and a la cucaracha air horn all while the daily driver is a tahoe with 26 inch rims. I probably fit most stereo types you can throw at me but I still manage to break the mold because I am into NASCAR and play golf. You should see the looks I get when I pull up to the course in a lowrider. :laughing7:

 

[OzziePete]

We have cyclones in Australia (hurricanes) but they occur in the tropical northern part of Australia.

Worst I have ever been exposed to was what would have been described as a muthaf** huge, deluge / storm on the Central Coast a couple of years back, that caused flash flooding, loss of power for a couple of days in most parts of the Coast (tho some poor souls were still without power a week later), trees down everywhere (inc our townhouse block, tho one big tree thankfully had its fall onto the roof of our number 3 townhouse broken by a smaller tree in front).

The storm itself was a cracker. Sky went a horrible dark redddish colour, day started out overcast and just got worse and worse as the day went on. I stupidly went to work in Sydney for that evening, and had troubles getting home. The main freeway (F3) to the Coast was like trying to drive ina war zone - you couldn't drive on lanes 1 & 3 of the carriageways as there were trees and shrubs down on either side of the carriageway. Where you'd normally do 110km/h you were lucky to brave 60..poor visibilty, wind buffeting and flooding in parts of the road = aquaplaning.

My work that evening was cancelled as the Ferries in Sydney had been cancelled due to really bad waves in the harbour in fact, one of the Ferry Wharfs (Cremorne Wharf) sank, and Sydney's harbour is one of the safest in the world. Lord knows what the surf was like outside the Heads!

I got sent up to the north of Sydney to replace trains on the Central Coast line in case the trains were shut down again (they had been earlier due to a problem with the lines), but I luckily just sat in the layup area. One of our more experienced drivers took some people up the F3 to Gosford and said it was one of the worst drives he had had...very hard with the bus being buffeted around by 100km'h + winds..Of course when I tried to get home in my car later,  I realised what he meant.

But we are lucky this far south in Australia...we don't get the cyclonic weather the north suffers regularly. And when you talk to folks who have experienced a few cyclones, you soon realise that what I went through on that night a couple of years was nothing!

Whole towns have been obliterated in the past and will continue to be if the wrong weather comes their way.

 

[Cagey]

I've never understood people's desire to build houses in harm's way. An unusual storm every once in a great while is understandably forgotten, but some areas here get just obliterated over and over again quite regularly, and they keep rebuilding in the same spot. Then, there are areas where while there might not be devastating weather very often, but they're just unnaturally unsafe places to build. New Orleans come to mind, where the whole town is well below sea level and it's built on the shoreline of a major body of water known to throw up hurricanes. You know ahead of time you're going to have serious trouble one day, so why even start down that road? It's like playing Russian Roulette.

 

[Patrick]

I get what youre saying but New Orleans was a French colony and a major port back in the day. It's been a crowded city since the 1700's  :dontknow:

 

[Velcro]

Luckily I have not experianced any adverse weather conditions. :icon_smile: